kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Cirilo Bernardo <cirilo_bernardo@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi folks,

 I've been working on tools for creating IDF component outlines for use with the IDF exporter. At the moment I have 2: (1) creates outlines for axial and radial leaded cylinders, and (2) creates outlines for rectangles (chamfered in 1 corner to represent reference pin on SMT and DIL packages); I plan to write a third and final tool which will convert an outline from DXF to IDF; that tool will allow users to use outlines drawn in LibreCAD (qcad) or other 2D MCAD packages. Drawing in LibreCAD is much easier than creating the outlines by hand.

 For me it makes no sense to have these tools separate from KiCad, so I would like to ask for people's opinions on where the tools should go. On my development branch I have them in a directory called "utils" and in a subdirectory called "idftools".  My reasoning was that other utilities may be added to KiCad in the future, so it's not such a good idea to place all the source code into the 'utils' directory.

 I'm also working on documentation but I'm slowly learning how to use LibreOffice. I think eventually most of the IDF documentation should stand on its own but at least one chapter on using the exporter should also be copied into the cvpcb and pcbnew user manuals.

 Any comments / suggestions?

Regards,
Cirilo