kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Dick Hollenbeck <dick@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Wayne,

I enabled an experimental feature when USE_FP_LIB_TABLE is in play.

If you pass a nickname-less (nickname is blank) FPID from eeschema FOOTPRINT field through
netlist into pcbnew, there is a compile flag to take that incomplete FPID and do a
sequential search through all nicknames for the footprint.

Please take a look at this, see how much I broke.  To make it work I extended:

   MODULE* PCB_BASE_FRAME::loadFootprint( const FPID& aFootprintId )

to take the partial FPID.

It actually works.  Was concerned about side effects, and I would like for the Reporter to
tell which nickname was used.  This is obtainable from the MODULE itself, since that
nickname portion is set in FP_LIB_TABLE::FootprintLoad().  So the Reporter could be using
that nickname, rather than the blank nickname in the original FPID.

The sequential search is alphabetical through all nicknames.  (Please, no talk of "search
paths", which are on a death march.)

I don't know about other side effects.   It is enabled by compiling in ALLOW_PARTIAL_FPID
from netlist.cpp.

Let me know what you think.  I don't see where it is important long term, after a person
can actually pick a footprint from eeschema sensibly, so I am thinking it is a short term
aid only.


Dick