kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Jon Neal <reportingsjr@xxxxxxxxx>]

I would really like to see KiCad work better on 1366x768 screens. This was
pretty much the de facto standard laptop screen resolution until the last
year or two.

The laptop I currently use daily is this resolution and I expect to get
another few years out of it at least. I realize it is a fairly small
resolution, but it is what I have and I know is still super, super common.

Jon

On Thu, Oct 15, 2015 at 1:05 PM, Markus Hitter <mah@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> Am 15.10.2015 um 17:29 schrieb Adam Wolf:
> > Markus,
> >
> > I appreciate your enthusiasm, but I do not think saying "KiCad works on
> > computers" is going to help our users or our developers.  I think this is
> > actually a question of opportunity cost and focus, similar to your other
> > posts from the last few days.
>
> Adam,
>
> thanks for explaining what the motivations are. I have to admit that I
> almost get into a rage when I read all this cheering about how foolish a
> user working on simple hardware would be. A large screen is entirely
> fine (I have one, too) for those who enjoy them, but declaring somebody
> as dumb who has choosen to not use one is certainly not respectful.
> Especially in the hobbyist area most people do very simple things, so
> there is simply no need for rendering 10'000 tracks at 60 fps. These
> users are perfectly fine with much less, so I try to put in a vote for
> them.
>
>
> > Opportunity cost and focus, mostly.
> [...]
> > If we have to design KiCad so it works great on 800x600 screens, for
> > example, is that extra *manual* testing on every single GUI change for
> > developers?  (today, yes.)
>
> I'd be entirely fine with stating exactly this. "Graphics is tested with
> 1024x768 and larger, your mileage may vary with smaller screens". Sounds
> much much better than "only a fool would try on 800x600".
>
> [...]
> > Does it help or hurt if we say "KiCad can use the GPU to make PCB editing
> > of larger boards more responsive.  Nicer GPUs, like the Frobnitz Zorkmid
> > EXTREME, work better than software GPUs like the Foobar H3."
>
> Also a good, helpful description. It makes clear that nobody tries to
> stop users from using the software. Actually it sounds very positive,
> because it describes that KiCad is capable of taking advantage of
> accelerated hardware.
>
> [...]
> > If I end up spending
> > 100% of my time supporting users who expect KiCad will work amazingly on
> > their 200 mhz Cyrix, they're going to have a bad time, and I'm going to
> > have a bad time.
>
> While I'm new to KiCad, I'm not new to Open Source development in
> general. Yes, there are always users which try to get developers into
> additional work. Asking is cheap, after all. Experience is, this never
> stops, no matter where one draws the line. If you claim to fully support
> 800x600 they'll ask for support on their phone. If you support phones
> they'll ask for these 384x240 embedded displays. And so on, to no end.
> Still it's not helfpul to rigorously show them the door.
>
> A simple and, to my experience, well working solution is to ask these
> people for their code. Along the lines of "We currently have no
> developer being interested in writing such code, but if you contribute
> it, we'll likely accept it". 9 of 10 people will walk away after such a
> statement, without being miffed. If the tenth user actually comes up
> with code, all the better!
>
>
> Markus
>
> --
> - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
> Dipl. Ing. (FH) Markus Hitter
> http://www.jump-ing.de/
>
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