kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Wayne Stambaugh <stambaughw@xxxxxxxxx>]

On 3/6/2018 4:18 PM, Robbert Lagerweij wrote:
> Op 5-3-2018 om 18:49 schreef Wayne Stambaugh:
>> All kidding aside, I was told by a very highly skilled board designer
>> not to waste our time with auto-routers because no one actually uses
>> them except for the simplest designs with lots of free board space and
>> few or no routing restrictions.  This is someone who uses Altium in his
>> day job and has laid out far more boards than I have.  I'm guessing
>> auto-routers appeal to hobbyists rather than professionals.
> I guess this begs the question, who is kicad targeting? Are we trying to 
> serve the professionals or also be a tool for the less skilled 
> (comparative) masses.

For those of you who are new here, the answer is professionals.  If we
can accommodate hobbyists without alienating professional designers all
the better but I will not throw professional developers under the bus to
appease the hobbyists.

> 
>> There are far more useful features to add to KiCad
>> than auto-routing.  If we ever get to the point we are sitting around
>> twiddling our thumbs, then we should work on an auto-router.
> I absolutely agree, but after reading this article 
> https://wp.josh.com/2017/10/23/adventures-in-autorouting/, I did find 
> myself wondering what a Google Summer of Code Student (with some 
> opencl/machine learning/other buzzword skills) might be able to do with 
> the auto-router.

I'm not going to hold my breath on that one.  How many students do you
know that are expert board designers?  I'll lean on my developers who
understand how to layout a board for this one.  I'm not a buzz word kind
of developer. ;)

> 
> Robbert
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