Re: gEDA-user: Inkscape text->pstoedit->pcb and importing PostScript/PDF/EPS vector graphics with holes

[Mark Rages <markrages@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Mon, Nov 22, 2010 at 3:06 PM, Colin D Bennett <colin@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> On Mon, 22 Nov 2010 13:50:03 -0600
> Mark Rages <markrages@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> On Mon, Nov 22, 2010 at 1:29 PM, Colin D Bennett <colin@xxxxxxxxxxx>
>> wrote:
>> > How hard would it be to make use of the freetype library to handle
>> > all vector-based fonts?  I imagine the font outlines could be
>> > converted to line elements fairly easily... ?
>>
>> pcb's fonts are special:  they are a single line wide.  When you need
>> the smallest letters that a given silk process can print legibly, you
>> want those single-line fonts.
>
> OK, that is understandable.  I can see that it would be extremely
> difficult to get an automated conversion of general fonts to
> single-line-wide fonts.  Perhaps still possible, for simple sans-serif
> fonts by varying the line width dynamically?  Anyway, it sound
> difficult enough that it won't be done.
>
>> For larger fonts, freetype would be great, and save us the
>> machinations of creating the text in inkscape or something and
>> importing it with pstoedit.
>
> I really wanted to create a logo/description label in Inkscape and put
> it on a board I recently made, but after trying for an hour or two to
> get pstoedit to import text elements properly (holes in letters like 'B'
> or 'o' were getting filled in when exported to the 'pcb' file format),
> I gave up.  I tried the '-ssp' option to pstoedit but it crashed every
> time an assertion failure.  Have you had better luck with converting
> text or graphics to pcb format?
>
> My results:
>
> - Converting text without -ssp option:  pstoedit doesn't crash, but
>  letters have their holes filled in
>
> - Converting text with -ssp option: pstoedit crashes
>
> I have successfully converted a simple open triangle drawn with a 30 mil
> stroke from Inkscape->pstoedit->pcb, but even the simplest text causes
> pstoedit to crash.  Here's an example that crashes for me.  The file
> Text.ps simply contains an uppercase letter 'A' in Liberation Sans
> font.  I also checked the 'export text as paths' option for the file
> Text_notext.ps but pstoedit still crashed.  I'm using pstoedit 3.50 on
> Ubuntu 10.04/amd64 and have also tested on pstoedit 3.45 under Ubuntu
> 9.10/i386, with the same result.
>
>  cdb@svelte:~$ pstoedit -f pcb Text.ps -ssp Text.pcb
>  pstoedit: version 3.50 / DLL interface 108 (build Jan 25 2010 -
>  release build - g++ 4.4.3) : Copyright (C) 1993 - 2009 Wolfgang Glunz
>  pstoedit: drvbase.h:789: const Point& drawingelement<nr,
>  curtype>::getPoint(unsigned int) const [with unsigned int nr = 0u,
>  Dtype curtype = (Dtype)2u]: Assertion `(i+1) < (nr+1)' failed.
>  Aborted
>  cdb@svelte:~$ pstoedit -f pcb Text_notext.ps -ssp Text_notext.pcb
>  pstoedit: version 3.50 / DLL interface 108 (build Jan 25 2010 -
>  release build - g++ 4.4.3) : Copyright (C) 1993 - 2009 Wolfgang Glunz
>  pstoedit: drvbase.h:789: const Point& drawingelement<nr,
>  curtype>::getPoint(unsigned int) const [with unsigned int nr = 0u,
>  Dtype curtype = (Dtype)2u]: Assertion `(i+1) < (nr+1)' failed.
>  Aborted
>
> I haven't had a chance to file a bug for pstoedit or dig any deeper,
> but I wondered if anyone has encountered this problem before, and if
> there is a workaround.
>

I've seen this bug before too.  Try "text to path" in Inkscape.  If
that fails, binary search for the offending text: Delete half of it,
try again, etc.  Please do file the bug on pstoedit.

Regards,
Mark
markrages@gmail
-- 
Mark Rages, Engineer
Midwest Telecine LLC
markrages@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx


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