Re: gEDA-user: Toporouter update?

[Anthony Blake <tonyb33@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi,

On Wed, Mar 17, 2010 at 4:48 AM, Kai-Martin Knaak <kmk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On Wed, 24 Feb 2010 09:10:29 -0500, Ethan Swint wrote:
>
>> On 02/23/2010 06:46 PM, Anthony Blake wrote:
>>>> Ok, then. Can you compile a list of tasks that need to be accomplished
>>>> before the topo router is ready for general use? The smaler the
>>>> individual tasks, the more likely they can be tackled by low time
>>>> hackers like me...
>>> For sure. It would require some careful consideration though.. I'll get
>>> back to you within a week.
>> Keep me in the loop, too.
>
> bump the topic up...

Since this thread started, I've discussed continuing work on the
toporouter with my Uni supervisors. They are OK with me taking time
off from my PhD if the GSoC thing goes ahead. I would prefer to do
most of the core work myself, rather than try and get others to
implement my 'half baked' and untested ideas.. The idea of getting
someone to implement something that I'm not even sure of myself
doesn't seem right..

As for smaller individual tasks.. I was thinking that an abstraction
layer for the autorouters might be a good idea. We now have 1.5
autorouters (very soon to be 2x complete autorouters), and an
abstraction layer would help future work built on top of the
autorouters, such as the auto-plow feature Harry Eaton mentioned,
seamlessly switch between the underlying autorouters.. An abstraction
layer would also be a good first step towards untangling the
toporouter from PCB, and making it more of a general open source
autorouter.

Another small task, which would *really* help me, would be an
automated testing framework for the autorouters. I would like to have
some tool which I could throw a directory of unrouted boards at, and
for each board it comes back with images of the output from the
toporouter & the autorouter, as well as performance results (wiring
length, runtime etc).

Someone also suggested switching out the absolute wiring length metric
with sum of each nets wiring length to MST length ratio.. That would
be a good small task to familiarize oneself with the toporouter &
autorouter code.. and the results would be very interesting if that
metric is also used as the cost function in the net ordering.

btw, if there are other little projects or features you would like to
add.. I'm happy to help in anyway I can, including being available on
IM/IRC to answer questions..

Also, can anyone think of a new name for the toporouter? There is
already a commercial tool called the 'toporouter', which I don't want
us to be confused with.

Regards,
Anthony


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