[Author Prev][Author Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Author Index][Thread Index]

Re: gEDA-user: moving slotting to pcb?



John Doty wrote:
On Jun 26, 2010, at 11:18 AM, DJ Delorie wrote:

A random thought occurred to me today - why does gschem do slotting at all? Why does it care about footprints and packages?

There's no reason for it to. There's not even any reason to select part values.
> Putting these things into source schematics is a barrier to reuse.

Would it make more sense, from a design flow perspective, to just send the
>>symbolic information to pcb and let pcb assign footprints and pinouts?

No. <snip> For documentation, most will want the pin numbers, refdeses, values,
> etc. to match the board as built.
<snip>
No reason to change pcb. What we need is a schematic processor to sit between gschem and gnetlist. Expand hierarchy, assign slots and values, turn the source schematics into project schematics for both netlisting and documentation.

What are good names for symbolic only source schematics and those with
as built values?  We have a traditional naming where even the suffix
suggests only one meaning -- schematic for .sch.

I think of circuit before giving all the detailed pins, packages, and values
to a design.  What if we started using two documents, called circuit and
schematic, where one can be derived from the other, and to keep that
possible a DRC points out any conflicts between them?

The drawing suffixes could be .sch and .ckt.  If schematic is what someone
enters, the .ckt file is just that same drawing with the extra details
stripped out.  If you stretch a wire in one, it stretches in the other,
but values, packages, and pin numbers don't "stick" in the circuit view,
only in schematic view?

phil wrote:

> DJ, this reminds me of a set of improvements I'd throw into the ring
> because if PCB knew which nets were power nets, and so forth as provided
> by gschem it'd be the beginning of categorization or even
> hierarchicalization of the nets.

I'd like to see these concepts handled by attributes attached to nets in
the schematic or reusable circuit view, and then passed to other tools
to use or not use.

PCB will be able to preserve attributes like those soon, I bet.
And then once you can select by attribute match anded with other matches,
you've got lots of visible look changes you can do with action commands
acting on the selected set.

John Griessen
--
Ecosensory   Austin TX


_______________________________________________
geda-user mailing list
geda-user@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user