kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Wayne Stambaugh <stambaughw@...>]

Dick Hollenbeck wrote:
>> Agreed! Too many drawing object manipulations (fonts included) happen
>> outside of the device context. I'm guessing that before we can
>> effectively use wxFont, we are probably going to have to fix the the
>> drawing code to allow the device context to handle things like
>> coordinate scaling, offsetting, and clipping internally. If we need any
>> coordinate manipulation or specific drawing code that wxDC does not
>> provide, than we should derive our own DC from wxDC to provide any
>> missing or unique functionality rather than manipulate this outside of
>> the DC. I know this is off topic but piling more drawing code on top of
>> the current drawing code will just make Kicad harder to maintain.
>>
>> Wayne
>>
>> 
> 
> 
> This is not off topic. We have had to do these manipulations because 
> wxWidgets wxDC was not adequate to the task. Yet as it has evolved, we 
> have not kept up. wxGraphicsContext is a whole new ball game. We 
> continue to carry baggage to work around a weak graphics API, yet we 
> have not really explored the more powerful graphics API found in 
> wxGraphicsContext.

Dick,

I have been working on this but the going has been really slow. There
is so much coordinate manipulation the various bits of Kicad drawing
code that trying to use wxDCs coordinate conversion code breaks lots of
drawing code. I am tempted just to rip all out and start at ground
zero. If we are serious about replacing wxDC with wxGraphicsContext,
then perhaps I should be using it instead of wxDC.

> Another thing that concerns me: less than a month ago we introduced a 
> new font architecture. Now we hear that it is not adequate. I don't 
> think that the folks who brought us that solution should now control the 
> font solution path forever. In fact, I would say that they have 
> demonstrated that they need additional ideas from others, by virtue of 
> the fact that the original solution is now being thought of as 
> inadequate or not comprehensive enough. We got a better looking 
> screen, but some folks who had put in the international characters in 
> the original font support lost that, no?
> 
> Just being candid, and trying to get a more comprehensive discussion of 
> all the options available to us. I encourage exploratory coding........

You'll get no argument from me. I would rather take the time to
implement a complete well thought out solution rather then several
incremental ones. I prefer not to have to do things over. However, if
others have the free time to keep reimplementing font solutions, by all
means code away. I just do not have that kind of free time. Please try
to take into consideration that the drawing context code needs fixed
when you are implementing any new drawing code.

Wayne

> 
> 
> Dick