kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Lorenzo Marcantonio <l.marcantonio@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Tue, Jun 04, 2013 at 12:44:08PM -0700, NHays Terrace wrote:
> Alternatively, the exporter could build a zone for each flash.

A little heavy but could work. However the exporter would have to
rebuild the netlist, I don't know if it can do it.

More likely it could build a virtual module containing the flash (I use
such modules for equipontential joints, for example). The microwave gap
tool IIRC uses a similar technique.

> In general, pcbnew's drawing object set is fairly specific to pcb related
> objects which limits expansion.

Uh... maybe I don't get the idea correctly... pcbnew is *only* for pcb,
so it's natural that only handles pcb related objects.

> A good example is how pads are found only within modules and plotting them
> uses a flash.

I would like an example of the usefulness of a lonely flash outside of
a module... I can't think of any.

> That flash capability is not generally available outside of that use, i.e.
> as a gr_flash in the pcb file.

That's because probably the developers (like me) can't see *why* someone
would use a flash outside a module.

> Generic grouping of objects is another common component of graphics
> programs.

Too bad that pcbnew is a *pcb* program. Even the, for example,
perspective tool is a common component for graphics programs, but has
nothing to do with pcb design. However, I agree that sometimes some kind
of grouping could be useful (maybe for repeated stages or such)

> I would like to <ctl> click objects to select several of them, then r-click
> and select 'group'.
> 
> Then I can move them as a unit - extremely useful.

More or less what I described. Too bad there is nothing in the pcbnew
code to do something like that:P The pcbnew database is flat, not
hierarchical.

> I hope to have time come September to contribute with code.  For now, I
> would just like to dialog about what is good to think about/work on.

I feel that would be a lot of work for a minor feature... I don't ever
had the need or wanted a 'grouping' feature. However feel free to work on
it, I personally think that maybe *could* be useful for someone (good luck
making the collector classes work correctly...)

-- 
Lorenzo Marcantonio
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