kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Jon Evans <jon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

I agree settings should be in a different dialog.  I kind of think they
should go in the main preferences window as another entry (there will be
multiple "project level" preferences panes, so DRC/ERC setup could be part
of that).
That taxonomy of reporting level sounds good to me.

I put my thoughts on taxonomy in a doc here for comment:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1r6tveX475pcCU-Gmv1rKIWM4i8ATsQVoWgNTytc0Ctw/edit#

-Jon

On Wed, Feb 26, 2020 at 6:22 AM Jeff Young <jeff@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> OK, I’m coming around to the idea of a hybrid system (tabs + outline +
> severity filtering).
>
> Jon, could you post your violation taxonomy here?
>
> On the settings front, I do actually think they belong in a different
> dialog (a la Allegro).  But we could have a right-button menu though that
> takes you from an error to the preferences panel.
>
> The taxonomy I’d propose for the setting would be:
> - error
> - warning
> - info
> - ignore
>
> The first 3 allow filtering; the last one is Allegro’s “off”.
>
>
> On 26 Feb 2020, at 00:34, Evan Shultz <evan.shultz@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> A few thoughts from the peanut gallery...
>
> I strongly agree with Jon here, as a power user of Allegro's Constraint
> Manager. It simply _is_ complicated to navigate a full-featured design rule
> system. There will (may?) not be a way of getting around that when a lot of
> constraints have been added. Adding loads of tabs spreads things out which
> hurts users who are really using the design rule system. It can be
> overbearing at first, and making an easy on-ramp for novice users can be a
> challenge, but I would hate to see a powerful design rules system that
> doesn't work well for those who want to use it's capabilities. Allegro has
> a dialog that turns each constraint on and off, which is totally separate
> from setting up the values of each constraint. I personally think bringing
> those two together would be helpful as they're tightly integrated.
>
> If knowing how Allegro does it, simply to get another perspective but
> certainly not as an example of the "correct way" to do something in an ECAD
> tool is helpful, just let me know.
>
> It could possibly be easier to manage if a simple graphic pops up for each
> design rule showing a generic representation to what that constraint
> pertains. Something like the Altium screenshot you showed above, Jon. Being
> able to select a DRC marker and then get information about what's causing
> it will help all users. Another helpful feature would be if two elements
> could be selected and their constraints viewed, so that even if a DRC isn't
> being generated the user can query the board. Lastly, some kind of report
> would be useful to let a user search for net names and ref des and other
> elements to see the design rules in the board, and if the report is
> reasonably human-readable it might also suffice for an import/export design
> rule file format.
>
> One way of perhaps using tabs would be to break the pieces of the design
> rule system down into different areas: electrical (trace lengths, diff
> pairs, etc.), copper (allowable vias, trace widths, etc.), spacing,
> silkscreen (silk over pads, min silk line width, courtyards, etc.). That
> might allow a tab for each area with a tree system for the constraints
> within each area. A spacing matrix is a powerful visualization tool which
> could also fit into a tab.
>
> One thing I haven't seen mentioned are the handling of groups of elements,
> such as multiple traces which need their lengths matched or a net class
> that contains multiple nets. How that is shown in the UI might require
> another level since each of those groups must break out the elements within
> it to help the user configure the groups and track down where a DRC is
> being generated.
>
> On Tue, Feb 25, 2020 at 4:12 PM Eeli Kaikkonen <eeli.kaikkonen@xxxxxxxxx>
> wrote:
>
>>
>>
>> On Wed, Feb 26, 2020 at 1:29 AM Jon Evans <jon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>
>>>
>>> The problem with tabs is that they can only expand so far before you
>>> have to start scrolling (and so some tabs are not visible).
>>>
>>> Yes, that's why I thought a combination of tabs and a tree (or grid as
>> you said) may be good. There's still free space for a tab or two. Indeed,
>> post-v5 the footprint warnings have got their own. I have always thought
>> that the messages about non-continous edge cut don't belong with the rest,
>> so I would move them to their own tab.
>>
>> Eeli Kaikkonen
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