kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Miguel Angel Ajo Pelayo <miguelangel@xxxxxxx>]

    Hi everybody,

       Recently Edwin told me about an idea he had seen in another CAD
package, it was nice, but required some hacking and I didn't see the
advantages at that moment, the idea is as follows, and I will tell you the
where I could use it (later on this email)

Idea:

      * Adding a dictionary (key->value) pairs to every object (track, via,
module, polygon, etc...) that gets saved and loaded from files,
                        It could be used for annotation (to be used later
at manufacturing), to add relative references to other elements in the
board (like
                        my.X=U12.X+10mm), it could be very handy with
scripting.
                       [please Edwin, add some ideas of the uses of this
feature]


Where do I find it useful:

          * Ok, imagine that you create a module with a certain wizard, and
you put it into the board (a capacitive slider, for example, or a pcb
spiral transformer), and then, at any moment you discover that you need it
to be bigger, wider, or shorter. If this object (MODULE now) had a set of
key->values like this:

"wizard"--->"Touch Slider Wizard"
"wizard_params" ---> "steps=4,width=10mm,length=50mm"

        Then the wizard could show up again (if installed) and let you
modify that object parametrically... or even better, in the PCB editor
itself, the object could have drag markers (for length or width) that would
let you draw and recalculate your object (but I prefer first
implementation).


       This would require for something like this in the s-expr brd format:

         (param "key" "value")  to be allowed to be included into any
object, and also, for every object (EDA_ITEM) to have a dictionary inside.


      I'm not asking for anyone to do it, but for enhancements or reasons
not to do it. :-)


Greetings,
Sicerely, Mike :-)




-- 

Miguel Angel Ajo Pelayo
http://www.nbee.es
+34 636 52 25 69
skype: ajoajoajo