Re: gEDA-user: pcb library and hid build modification

[DJ Delorie <dj@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

> hid plugins can be built without the whole source tree.

We can already do that.  Heck, it's been done, too - Igor added an
interpreter engine much like what swig does, which supports writing
interpreted HIDs.

> The real point of the patch was that I want to create swig bindings
> for pcb and libgeda in support of another geda subproject I'm working
> on.  To do that I really need a library to build the bindings against.

Except that PCB is an application, not a library.  If swig assumes the
target is a library (I don't think it does), perhaps that means that
swig is a bad choice?  Or perhaps you could change the way you're
trying to use it?  As soon as we split out a library, we have to start
worrying about compatibility across releases, which is a pain.

> Admittedly, there is more work that needs to be done to properly
> separate the pcb executable from the libpcb library and provide some
> more API coherency.
> 
> I'm willing to do that,

Doing it right is a lot of work, and if we're putting that much work
into the core design of pcb, I'd rather shoot for a bigger prize than
just "support swig".  For example, I'd like to redo how drawing tools
and board objects are handled internally so we can extend those with
plugins as well.  We've also gotten many requests for enhancements to
the board layout, which would require design changes.  Formalizing an
API would make it more difficult to make those changes, if only
because people would complain when you change the API.

Plus, you'd still have to convince us that we need a "libpcb".


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