gEDA-user: Re: an attribute editor program

[John Griessen <john_g@cibolo.com>]

Stuart,

that sounds like a fine project for another day, but maybe soon....  I've been hearing 
about uses of and reading how to make web app server programs with python...  
and then I came across a python developer/entrepreneur/web-hoster with a free 
offer that goes like:  If your application is not commercial and you can get by 
without emails and a database program, you can have a web site under 
freecherrypy.org/ for free, and it has an instance of cherrypy app server/compiler built in.

This free offer could be used like sourceforge to host development of 
app server programs that talk with and become an integral part of a workflow
of gEDA applications.   There would be no need to download and install source code
unless you wanted to for speed performance, or to start adding to the development.  To just use
a web app server module we could add hooks in the normal gEDA tool software.  Config files
could hold a variable that is the app server URL or URI and as long as you are connected to 
the net, you could use some rapidly developed tools that depend on having a certain spreadsheet
like gnumeric available, even if your computer does not have gnumeric installed... the web app server host 
has it installed as part of the deal...  Since the offer is for free, why not have three web app server instances
to mimic debian's stable, testing and unstable versions of the app?  Since it would naturally be a multiuser
server, it would require some extra considerations about memory reserved per user,
parallelism, ability to use other servers than the usual -- that might be a stopper, sine it is extra effort 
compared to the usual code you install locally.   Immediacy counts though, for getting anything to happen,
and I have a gut feel that such a method of developing "tool software"  would be perceived as mutually beneficial
to the "tool developers", "tool users", and "web hosters".   At least until circuit design gets as popular as 3D virtual
online game worlds...

John Griessen

On Tue, 2003-10-21 at 12:55, Stuart Brorson wrote:
>  a useful gEDA tool might be an attribute editor program
> (gattrib) which reads in a  schematic, finds all the components, and
> then shows them to the user via a spreadsheet interface.   Each
> component would occupy a row, and the various attributes would occupy
> the columns, like this: 
> 
> REFDES	DEVICE		VALUE	FOOTPRINT	MODEL-NAME	FILE
> U1 	LM311			so8		LM311		/path/to/spice-model
> R1	RESISTOR	100K	0603
> C1	CAPACITOR	1uF	0603		
> U2	LF356		LF356	so8		
> 
> (This will look better if you use a constant spacing sized font.)  Of
> course, other attributes would also appear in the following columns.  
> 
> Then, you could use gattrib to edit the attributes, and attach new
> ones easily.  Right now, you've got to do a lot of clicking to use
> gschem to attach attributes to all the parts.  This would be a lot
> easier, particularly for larger schematics.
> 
> Another way to do this is to create a prog which reads .sch and .sym
> files and exports to gnumeric (or even creates whitespace deliminated
> .txt).  A similar prog would be used to read the output spreadsheet
> format and stick the attribute values back into the .sch and .sym
> files.  This would be very easy using Perl or Python.  
> 
> Well, this is a project for another day.
> 
.
.
.
> Stuart
-- 
John Griessen    Cibolo Design       Austin Texas
EE good at IR systems, power supplies, logic design, A2D D2A, digital amps, 
mechatronics, SiGe and CMOS layout, MEMS/mech/electronic/photonic 
modeling, charge pump PV/battery/fuel cell power converters, more...