kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[jp charras <jp.charras@xxxxxxxxxx>]

Le 14/01/2015 19:32, Miguel Angel Ajo Pelayo a écrit :
> As a reference: In other EDA tools they can load newer files on older
> versions of the software.  They just open a warning window with
> everything which is not read/processed, and tell you everything not
> readed will be lost at next save.
> 

There is not a lot of free EDA tools so I don't know the actual meaning
of "In other EDA tools"

Keep in mind commercial software has very different constrains:

1 - they have much more (I am expecting) man-hours we have.
2 - because they are very expensive, they *cannot* ask for user to
update the software. Kicad is free and free of charges. We can ask.
3 - This issue is widely due to the fact we have a repos to which allows
user to download, compile and use current development versions. How many
commercial software have such a repos ?

To tell the true, I am not sure an old version opening and saving a file
still gives a working file: you don't know what is lost ( and be sure
the user is not able to know what is lost, and if this is an important
info, and warn he is not usefull).

To minimize issues when a old Kicad version open files created by new
versions, I am using this way:
When a new feature/option exists, it can have default values.
When this option uses default values, theses values are not saved, and
therefore do not create issues.
For new features, obviously if they are not used, avoid to save any info
about theses features.
This is not perfect ( mainly do not save defaults creates a major
constraint: defaults cannot be modified ) but it helps.

Having said that, I am also thinking we just skip data not recognized by
a old kicad version when reading a new file, warn the user and do not
reject the entire file, but we ask the user to update the Kicad version.

-- 
Jean-Pierre CHARRAS