Re: gEDA-user: Some kind of library manager and hierarchical netlisting

[r <nbs.public@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Thu, Nov 20, 2008 at 6:33 PM, John Doty <jpd@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> Can you explain in detail how do you generate the hierarchical
>> netlist?
>
> Here's a simplified version of my current flow.

Thanks! I'll try it. This method looks pretty good.

> 1. Don't use source= in your symbols.

That's bad and good.

Bad because it disables "hierarchical design support" in gschem (= you
no longer can navigate to subcircuits in gschem). Good because all the
design configuration is stored in only one place (Makefile).

> 5. For multipage schematics the generic rule won't work, need to make
> an explicit rule, but it's easy:
> foo.cir : foo.1.sch foo.2.sch
>        $(GNET)

No problem here. Out of curiosity, what do you use multi-page
schematics for in the IC design?

>> Although using Makefile doesn't seem particularly appealing
>> to me (I keep all my design data in a single place - schematics)
>
> Huh? Schematics are a graphical representation of a netlist. There is
> so much more that goes into a design. Requirements, high level
> simulation and optimization code, descriptive documentation, etc.

I keep all these, except maybe for optimization code, separately from
design data. The only exception is end-user documentation that itself
is a part of the product/design.

> Even for netlists, schematics are sometimes a second-rate
> representation. A drawing of a backplane that has nothing but a bunch
> of 100 pin connectors on it is pretty useless, but connector pinlists
> are nice "source files" both for netlists and text documentation.

I agree. However, the tools I use at my job, handle such a mixed
design environment quite well.

> It's a *trivial* hassle. It's like the engineer who wouldn't use the
> signal generator because its output was a type N, and he would only
> use BNC's. Get over it. Get an adapter. gEDA is an extremely flexible
> toolkit, adaptable to many flows. It's your job to do the tiny amount
> of thinking needed to adapt it to *your* flow. The alternative is
> something too inflexible to adapt at all. But with gEDA, as with many
> good things, a little resourcefulness goes a long way.

I feel I need to explain something. There is nothing wrong with
scripting the design flow. In fact, I do this all the time. However,
scripting is only good at the development stage when people want to
streamline their own "boring" job. Once they are done with this, the
result must be as "self-contained" as possible. If there is a build
script used it must be tested, documented etc., because it becomes a
part of the product. This Makefile-based flow is not different,
although it's simpler than I expected.

Finally, there is no magic in netlisting. This, except for drawing
schematics, is a basic function users normally expect from any design
entry tool. Netlisting the design really is not the place where
Makefile should be _required_.

Regards,
-r.


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