kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[jp charras <jp.charras@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Le 12/04/2013 08:44, Lorenzo Marcantonio a écrit :
> After long meditation my plan is this:
>
> First idea (really good but has issues)
>
> - Internal and names do not change (I myself am tired of
>    these renames)
>
> - Default layer names for a board are the the internal ones
>
> - In the layer setup the user can rename all the layers (the original
>    name is shown aside for reference if someone had the stupid idea to
>    rename the front mask to something idiot)
Do you mean show user name + original name in layer manager ?
One of constraints in layer manager is to avoid long layer names (the 
area used for the layer manager is no more usable for the board editor. 
Showing user name + original name in layer manager has also serious 
drawback.
The default layer names (very short) was chosen to avoid this drawback.
> - Plot file name get the user name
Some times ago, this was the case:
filenames were using the user layer name or the translated layer name, 
which is something like an user layer name.
There are some bug reports due to incorrect filenames (spaces, non ascii 
chars or illegal chars) .
The first thing I explain to my students why they do not use spaces and 
non ascii chars in filenames.
This is one of reasons the English native layer names are now used in 
plot filenames.
I know you can find more convenient to use the user layer name,
until you send such files to a board house in an other country and have 
a board with incorrect layer stack...
(It happens to me).
> Biggest issue:
>
> The sexp board file contains the 'user' names, and that's not good (both
> for me and for Dick), so in the layer section the 'user name' should be
> added. Additionally the copper layers should be used with the internal
> id, too (for consistency). In this way you'd have (for example) in the
> layer header Inner2 "Grounds" (user name) and for the whole other file
> it would be used as Inner2. Motivation: if you rename the Mask, Solder
> or Paste layer you lose the *.xxx wildcards.
>
> Second idea (partial but a lot easier to do):
>
> - You can rename copper and comments layer, special layers are fixed
>
> - In the file you get the user name (since there are no wildcards
>    involved nobody get hurt if I rename Comments to Clearances, for
>    example); the sexp parser already handle nonstandard layer because of
>    user copper names, so it should a painless modification.
>
> In both case obviously the module editor and non-board related stuff
> obviously keep the internal name.
>
> I think one of these should make *everybody* happy (I don't think that
> not renaming technical layer would be a big loss, anyway)
>
> Please comment
Why to change *now* the sexp board file ?
Have you found an issue when reading/writing board files ?
If yes, changes could be done.
If no, changing something will create incompatibility with the stable 
version only one month after the release!
This is a very serious drawback.

For me, user copper layer names has a meaning (and are needed) during 
the design of a board
(you need to know a layer is a gnd, a vcc, a +3.3V ... plane:
I recently worked on a 16 layers complicated board: it was useful)
Tech layers names are more an User Interface problem:
Renaming them could be made not at board level, but more at user config 
level ( like lib paths, window size, colors ...)
without any change in board files.
Remember if I open a Russian board (it sometimes happens), and if all 
technical layers names are in Russian language,
I'll have some trouble with them and no advantage to the renaming at 
board level.

--
Jean-Pierre CHARRAS