kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Wayne Stambaugh <stambaughw@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

On 6/4/2014 3:53 PM, Jean-Paul Louis wrote:
> All,
> 
> I do not see a Board Outline Layer (or Mechanical Layer) in any of the discussions.
> Where are defined the boundaries of the PCB?
> With other CAD tools, I have used a mechanical layer that was storing the Board Outline, and Any cut-outs and any non plated holes used for securing the board.
> That layer was easily imported from either a dwg or dxf drawing called the Board Blank.
> 
> Jean-Paul
> AC9GH

Edge.Cuts is the layer you are looking for.

> 
> 
> On Jun 4, 2014, at 3:35 PM, Wayne Stambaugh <stambaughw@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
>> On 6/4/2014 2:33 PM, Lorenzo Marcantonio wrote:
>>> On Wed, Jun 04, 2014 at 02:20:12PM -0400, Wayne Stambaugh wrote:
>>>> user confusion.  Where would you save them in the old kicad_pcb file
>>>> format after you made changes?  If Pcbnew where a read only application,
>>>> then this would be less of an issue.
>>>
>>> That's why I questioned if it would be desiderable...
>>>
>>> The only thing I think would be possible to keep *backward*
>>> compatibility is using optional forms, so if you don't use that feature
>>> the file remain compatible (no strange layers and the file still loads).
>>> I changed the quotation rules for the sexp in a backward compatible way
>>> and now they are both LISP and kicad compatible.
>>
>> Backwards compatibility is not optional.  We should always be able read
>> older board and footprint file formats.  That was one of the things that
>> drove the design of the current layer parsing of legacy boards and the
>> design of the new layer sexpr format.
>>
>>>
>>> PDF works in this way (unknown features are simply ignored), but it's
>>> designed to be an 'append only' format. And obviously javascript doesn't
>>> work in xpdf. However a PDF editor changing the rest of the file would
>>> probably break the javascript stuff (at most it could preserve the script
>>> object, but all the anchors could be broken...)
>>>
>>
>> I think we should steer the discussion towards defining what
>> improvements we need to make to the board and footprint file formats to
>> support the changes we have been discussing.  Once that is defined, we
>> can discuss the code changes required to handle the new layer
>> definitions.  Everything else depends on getting this correct.  Here is
>> a sample layer definition:
>>
>>  (layers
>>    (15 F.Cu signal)
>>    (0 B.Cu signal)
>>    (16 B.Adhes user)
>>    (17 F.Adhes user)
>>    (18 B.Paste user)
>>    (19 F.Paste user)
>>    (20 B.SilkS user)
>>    (21 F.SilkS user)
>>    (22 B.Mask user)
>>    (23 F.Mask user)
>>    (24 Dwgs.User user)
>>    (25 Cmts.User user)
>>    (26 Eco1.User user)
>>    (27 Eco2.User user)
>>    (28 Edge.Cuts user)
>>  )
>>
>> From the discussion, it sounds like we would need to add an F.KeepOut
>> and B.KeepOut for courtyard areas.  Maybe add F.KeepOutZ and B.KeepOutZ
>> for vertical keep out areas to prevent pick & place machine plunger
>> crashes on tall components.  It also sounds like folks are interested in
>> naming layers so we can optionally add a (name "My Layer Name") element
>> to the layer.  This would allow users to define their own names for
>> display purposes.  The only thing I'm not sure of is layer pairing that
>> was being discussed.  I would need a example of how that could be used.
>> So that would give us something like:
>>
>>  (layers
>>    (15 F.Cu signal (name "Front copper layer"))
>>    (0 B.Cu signal)
>>    (16 B.Adhes user)
>>    (17 F.Adhes user)
>>    (18 B.Paste user)
>>    (19 F.Paste user)
>>    (20 B.SilkS user)
>>    (21 F.SilkS user)
>>    (22 B.Mask user)
>>    (23 F.Mask user)
>>    (24 Dwgs.User user)
>>    (25 Cmts.User user (name "I put my comments here!"))
>>    (26 Eco1.User user)
>>    (27 Eco2.User user)
>>    (28 Edge.Cuts user)
>>    (33 F.KeepOut user)   # This could be any number > 32
>>    (34 B.KeepOut user)   # This could be any number > 32
>>    (35 F.KeepOutZ user)  # This could be any number > 32
>>    (36 B.KeepOutZ user)  # This could be any number > 32
>>  )
>>
>> You could use *.KeepOut and *.KeepOutZ for any module drawing element
>> (lines, arcs, circles, etc.) that are defined on both sides of a board.
>>
>> This should be a good start to get the discussion moving in the right
>> direction.
>>
>> Wayne
>>
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> 
>