kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Cirilo Bernardo <cirilo.bernardo@xxxxxxxxx>]

In addition to the STEP exporter (which is actually an external
program) there is
also the IDF exporter.  However, exporters in general currently do not
fit well in the
code; the original idea was to have a plugin system and API for
exporters but this
is a very big job and I haven't had time to work on it. The result was
that the STEP
exporter was created as an external program so that it doesn't pollute the KiCad
code too much.

- Cirilo

On Wed, May 3, 2017 at 1:20 AM, Jakub Skořepa <jakub@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Hello,
> I would like to implement 3D exporter to FBX format (proprietary to
> Autodesk, but also supported by blender and other software).
> Advantage to this is that it is directly supported by other software
> without need to convert the file.
>
> Where would be best place in the codebase to implement this?
>
> Currently there is vrml exporter in pcbnew/exporters, but it is 1800
> lines long and I would likely have to duplicate most of it, which would
> be really error-prone.
>
> Then there is c3d_render_createscene in 3d-viewer/3d_rendering/raytrace
> (1500 lines long) which implements mostly the same functionality as
> vrml exporter and that is creating geometry which then could be
> exported or rendered.
>
> End result of this duplication is that those parts behave differently
> (see attached images for screenshot from 3D-viewer and blender view of
> VRML export). It would be nice if there was some kind of intermediary
> representation which would be created from BOARD* and then different
> parts used this representation to generate their data. This would also
> supposedly simplify both renderers (ogl_legacy,raytrace) and VRML
> exporter and make it easier to create FBX exporter (and any future
> exporter).
>
> JS
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