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Re: Exchange/update footprints proposal

 

Hi Wayne,

Yes, the Update from Library case is the one I’m talking about.  I think the original reporter of the bug was only reimporting the netlist because he couldn’t find any other way that might do it.

But what do you mean by “Just update the footprint from the library”?  Changing it in the library won’t update the cached copy in the board.

Cheers,
Jeff.

> On 7 Jan 2018, at 22:28, Wayne Stambaugh <stambaughw@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> 
> Hey Jeff,
> 
> On 01/07/2018 05:17 PM, Jeff Young wrote:
>> Hi Wayne,
>> 
>> I think there’s a compromise in here somewhere, but I think you might have missed my main point which is that I don’t like conflating Change and Update.  They are not related in the user’s mind (even if the code is somewhat similar).
> 
> The only time "update" makes sense to me is when importing the netlist
> which doesn't require the change footprint dialog.  Otherwise, you are
> "changing" the footprint from it's current association (LIB_ID) in the
> netlist.  "Update from Library" might be a better term when there is no
> change in the footprint association and you just want to update the
> footprint from the library that it was loaded from.  In this case, a
> dialog isn't even necessary.  Just update the footprint from the library.
> 
>> 
>> Most of your comments relate to Change.  I wasn’t actually suggesting any changes there (other than removing the 4th global update option).
>> 
>> The two Update commands I suggested are additions.  We’d still have the Change stuff (and I like your empty-selection addition).
>> 
>> Cheers,
>> Jeff.
>> 
>> 
>>> On 7 Jan 2018, at 21:50, Wayne Stambaugh <stambaughw@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Jeff,
>>> 
>>> While I agree that the change footprint dialog is not easy to discover
>>> and some what confusing, I think your proposal is too restrictive.  I
>>> have an alternate proposal:
>>> 
>>> Leave the change footprint dialog as is.
>>> 
>>> When opening the change footprint dialog from the footprint context
>>> menu, keep the current behavior by preloading the reference and value of
>>> the selected footprint and making the reference and value controls read
>>> only.  In other words, no change.
>>> 
>>> Add an Edit->Change Footprint menu entry and a Change Footprint(s)
>>> context menu entry when no object is under the cursor and open the
>>> dialog with the reference and value controls empty and enabled according
>>> to the update type radio button selected.  This way the user could type
>>> a reference to replace a single footprint, a value to replace all
>>> footprints by value, or nothing when replacing all footprints.
>>> 
>>> Cheers,
>>> 
>>> Wayne
>>> 
>>> When opening the change dialog from the a
>>> On 01/06/2018 03:08 PM, Jeff Young wrote:
>>>> We’ve had some users be quite vocal about it being hard to update footprints from the library (and trying to use cvpcb to do so)[1].  While you can do this through the 4th option on the Exchange Footprints dialog, it’s pretty hidden.
>>>> 
>>>> Lumping together Exchange and Update is also confusing, whether in the selected footprint case or in the global case.
>>>> 
>>>> I’d like to propose the following changes (I’m happy to implement them):
>>>> 
>>>> 1) Add Edit > Update All Footprints.  This would open the Exchange Footprints dialog with all the update options and exchange information removed.
>>>> 
>>>> 2) Add Context Menu > Update Footprints (just under Exchange Footprints).  This would open the Exchange Footprints dialog with all the exchange information removed.
>>>> 
>>>> 3) Remove the fourth option (global update) from the Exchange Footprints dialog.
>>>> 
>>>> Thoughts?
>>>> 
>>>> Cheers,
>>>> Jeff.
>>>> 
>>>> [1] https://bugs.launchpad.net/kicad/+bug/1466857
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>>> 
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>> 



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