kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Russell Oliver <roliver8143@xxxxxxxxx>]

As a follow up to the road map discussion I saw a forum post asking if it
was possible to display the net name of a pad on the silkscreen or other
layers much like the value or reference fields.

While a simple implementation would be to create a text item directly
linked to each pad that could be enabled, and shows the link to the
relevant pad,  I think a more generic approach would be great to have.

I propose that either or both of these options for version 7.

a) standalone text items are processed as a template.  A domain specific
language would be designed to allow for references to items as direct text
substitutions. The implementation, scope and style of this DSL will need to
be workshopped and would like your comments on.

b) linked text (annotations) showing a graphical link (like the blue line
of values and reference ) A text item is created as a link to another item,
for which the text is derived from a list of properties of that item. This
would include such things as values, references, custom symbol and
footprint fields, sizes, positions, net names, net codes.

I'm almost certain this would require the updated Schematic object in
eeschema, but might already be achievable in pcbnew given its current
architecture, but that's more of a guess than anything.

Any thoughts, guidance or critiques would be appreciated.

Kind Regards
Russell