kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Wayne Stambaugh <stambaughw@...>]

Alain M. wrote:
> Wayne Stambaugh escreveu:

<< snipped >>
> 
> What about Wiki page about new usability for Kicad? We could all 
> contribute with that, so that whenever you get to coding some feature, 
> it perhaps has already been discussed...

Most if not all of the primary Kicad developers are on the mailing list.
It seems to be the most effective way to keep in touch with developers
concerning code changes. The wiki makes sense if I add some new feature
to let users know how to use it or some new code that requires some
detailed explanation. I try very hard to avoid writing code that needs
a lot of detailed explanation. Some day I may need to revisit that code
and understand what I did. I think Linus said it best in the "Linux
Kernel Coding Style" when he said "NEVER try to explain HOW your code
works in a comment: it's much better to write the code so that the
_working_ is obvious, and it's a waste of time to explain badly written
code".

> 
> For what I understand, you are doing deep basic code changes that will 
> not imidiately reflect in better usability, so it may even be more 
> important to do some planning ahead.
> 
> IMHO Kicad is great, really great. The major down point is usability...

For the end user, usability is a major problem. However, the current
code base makes fixing some of UI issues much more difficult than it
should be. This _is_ a major issue for developers. Unfortunately these
two issues are interdependent. You can't just change one without
effecting the other.

Wayne

> 
> Alain