kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Dick Hollenbeck <dick@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

Thanks Konstantin.

Clearly it was a major expenditure of effort and the time you put into the documentation
is very impressive.

Unfortunately I was not able to glean much from the code in a short time.

(I wonder if English "Specification" means the same thing in Russian as it does in English.)

Maybe I will run it and translate the UI strings as I go, but right now I have no idea
what it does.

The schematic sheet parsing could come in handy for somebody, but I was going to work with
the generic netlist xml file.

Right now I was hoping just to communicate at a high level in English.


Dick





On 11/07/2013 02:18 PM, Барановский Константин wrote:
> Hello Dick!
> 
> Please look at this https://launchpad.net/kicadbom2spec.
> Documentation on Russian but comments in sources on English.
> Hope it will be helpful.
> 
> Regards
> Konstantin
> 
> 07.11.2013 21:23, Dick Hollenbeck пишет:
>> After finishing a board today, I still feel like our BOM support is lacking, so I have
>> some thoughts to share, get some feedback, and maybe figure out how to get it coded in python.
>>
>>
>> My Definitions, so you can follow:
>> =======================================================
>> part = something from the eeschema library.
>>
>> component = something from one of the schematic sheets, an instantiation of a part.
>> ========================================================
>>
>> The problem is basically this in a nutshell:
>>
>>
>>      lack of "parts-list" support in eeschema.
>>
>>
>> To me a parts-list is a table of unique parts used, duplicates are coalesced into one row
>> by collating.  That is, if I have quantity (30) of 0.1uF caps, I'd expect them to show up
>> on one row in the parts list.
>>
>> Yes its nice to have "properties" for every component in the schematic, but it is simply
>> not practical to put component information into each instantiation, especially a
>> duplication of purchasing information.
>>
>> So I propose the following solution.  This is a python parts-list and BOM generator, and
>> requires no changes to eeschema.   Let me call it *bom_or_partslist.py* for the sake of
>> discussion.  It includes a python *.ods library of some kind, meaning it can read and
>> write to "open document format" spreadsheets, supported by OpenOffice, Libre, and
>> gnumeric.  These are files with extension *.ods.
>>
>> When invoked like this:
>>
>> bom_or_partslist.py --partslist <netlist>.xml
>>
>> it creates a parts list spreadsheet
>>
>>    <netlist>.PARTSLIST.ods.
>>
>> The parts list spreadsheet includes unique parts, one per row.  What constitutes unique?
>> Subject to discussion, but I am thinking the combination of "libpart + value", as if it
>> was a concatenated key.
>>
>> So the number of columns is minimal.  I guess to handle the whole work flow, the script
>> has to first check if the target *.ods exists already, and if so, is allowed only to
>> modify the left most column.
>>
>> User may add additional columns to the spreadsheet.  In mine, I would add Manufacturer and
>> Vendor and Price@1000, manually by editing the partslist spreadsheet.
>>
>> Note that I put the Manufacturer's part number into the same field with the manufacturer,
>> same with Vendor.  Note that this is a person choice, not actually part of this design,
>> since these are columns beyond the first one.
>>
>> e.g. Vendor:
>> "Digikey AE10968-ND"
>>
>> Same for Manufacturer, it actually holds *two* pieces of information, manufacturer and the
>> part number.
>>
>> -----------------
>>
>> When invoked like this:
>>
>> bom_or_partslist.py --bom <netlist>.xml
>>
>>
>> It generates a BOM file:
>>
>> 	<netlist>.BOM.ods
>>
>> by merging the <netlist>.BOM.ods file with the <netlist>.xml file.
>>
>> This means as you make purchasing choices, you do edits on only one place, once each for
>> each part.
>>
>> There would be two entries in the BOM dialog, both referencing the same script, but with
>> different names and parameters, one to generate or refresh the partslist and one to
>> generate the BOM.
>>
>> The hardest part of this is the regeneration of the partslist.  I may start by overwriting
>> what's there and work in the regeneration support as time permits.
>>
>> Can anyone suggest improvements?  The one's I will consider (if I code this myself) will
>> be easily implemented with good value.
>>
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Dick
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
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