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Re: gEDA-user: why separate xgsch2pcb?



Jason wrote:
Chris Cole wrote:
Jason wrote:
Chris Cole wrote:
Just curious, why not include xgsch2pcb functionality inside of
gschem?


As an aside, the first thing that lept to mind, was the Unix philosophy of "one tool, one job." So, I started digging to find where it came from. It's one of those "quoted all over the place,
but no origin to be found" kind of phrases.

The best I could find was this [1], which sums it up nicely.

I personally don't use xgsch2pcb.  I run gsch2pcb from a Makefile,
but that's my personal preference.  I prefer to script jobs that
shouldn't need to be interactive.  ymmv.

I personally don't use xgsch2pcb either (I might if it were part of gschem)... I'm definitely a script jockey too, but sometimes I like
to look at things from the perspective of those who can't / won't be
script jockeys. You know, the kind of people who are used to using
windows software and don't want to have to drop into a shell every 5
seconds to run commands. I think the Unix design philosophy is nice
for programs designed to be run strictly from the command line -- but
I think the line blurs a tad-bit when you cross over into a UI-based
programs. What's the workflow for a Windows-based EDA program like
Eagle?


To me, The 'A' answer is to treat the gui like a scripted workflow. All the CLI pieces underneath adhere to the Unix flexibility philosophy, and a scripted UI/GUI joins it all together into your particular workflow by calling each CLI program with the appropriate options based on user input.

Well put. This is why I don't necessarily think it's a bad idea to include gsch2pcb, or the ability to create a netlist, etc. in a GUI tool. Maybe it's not particularly suited inside gschem, however and the real tool that's missing is a gEDA IDE to help with the design workflow? I haven't been particularly fond of IDE's in the past, but that's mostly because they were software development IDE's and I like to write
code in Emacs :)



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