On Wed, 12 Jan 2005 07:51:38 -0500 (EST) [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Stuart Brorson) wrote:
> Bill, geda-dev readers,
>
> Here are a couple of changes I have made to gsch2pcb which might help
> newbies use it. I did these because I was experiencing annoyances
> taking a schematic to layout. Please find patches implementing these
> changes below.
>
> * I was continually annoyed by "Syntax error" messages when running
> pcb. These were occuring because I had unresolved M4 symbols in my
> design, and gsch2pcb/gnetlist was putting PKG_foo into the output
> file, which made pcb unhappy. To fix this I made "remove-unfound" the
> default behavior. This makes gsch2pcb keep PKG_foo out of the
> .new.pcb file if it can't resolve PGK_foo. I also installed flags -k
> and --keep-unfound into gsch2pcb if you do want to have PKG_foo show up
> in the .new.pcb file. These flags are documented when you do
> "gsch2pcb --help".
This seems OK to me.
>
> * Upon exit, I made gsch2pcb should provide instructions about what
> to do next. This is because it took me a while to figure out that I
> had to do "pcb foo.pcb" and then copy the new elements in via
> "file->load layout data to paste buffer". Is this documented
> anywhere? Probably, but I am lousy at reading the documentation, and I
> suspect that many newbies would also be confused by this.
It's in the tutorial, but I agree some help output is good.
> Here's an example of the output spew I get now when taking new
> footprints into a pre-existing project:
>
> ----------------------- <spew> ---------------------
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] ~/InorBoard]$ gsch2pcb project
> m4: /usr/X11R6/lib/X11/pcb/m4/common.m4: No such file or directory
> U?: can't find PCB element for footprint DIP14 (value=unknown)
> So device U? will not be in the layout.
> Rpwr: can't find PCB element for footprint SMD_1206 (value=10)
> So device Rpwr will not be in the layout.
> Z1: can't find PCB element for footprint SMB (value=1SMB5930BT3)
> So device Z1 will not be in the layout.
>
> Done processing. Work performed:
> 3 file elements and 0 m4 elements added to InorBoard.new.pcb.
> 3 unknown elements removed from InorBoard.new.pcb.
>
> Next steps:
> Run pcb on your file InorBoard.pcb. From within PCB, select
> "file -> Load layout data to paste buffer" and copy new
> footprints from InorBoard.new.pcb into your existing layout.
> --------------------- </spew> -----------------------
>
> Bill, if you like these patches, I can put them in gEDA CVS if you
> don't have access. Also, if you don't like the spew, I can create a
> -q/--quiet flag to quiet the output of gsch2pcb.
It's fine, but I think it should look at the initial_pcb flag and adjust
its output based on it. If it's generating the initial pcb, then you
won't be doing the "file -> Load layout data to paste buffer" from
within PCB. In this case, pcb_file_name and pcb_new_file_name
are the same. Also, since the keep unfound default is changed,
I think the error message sense can be improved.
So, I've attached a modified patch. Example tail end output:
----------------------
Original gsch2pcb:
...
1 file elements and 0 m4 elements added to filter.new.pcb.
2 not found elements added to filter.new.pcb.
--------------
Your patch:
...
Done processing. Work performed:
1 file elements and 0 m4 elements added to filter.new.pcb.
2 unknown elements removed from filter.new.pcb.
Next steps:
Run pcb on your file filter.pcb. From within PCB, select
"file -> Load layout data to paste buffer" and copy new
footprints from filter.new.pcb into your existing layout.
--------------------
Modified patch:
...
Done processing. Work performed:
1 file elements and 0 m4 elements added to filter.new.pcb.
2 elements could not be found. So filter.new.pcb is incomplete.
Next steps:
Run pcb on your file filter.pcb. From within PCB, select
"file -> Load layout data to paste buffer" and copy new
footprints from filter.new.pcb into your existing layout.
--------------------------------------------------
Modified patch if creating the initial pcb:
...
Done processing. Work performed:
139 file elements and 21 m4 elements added to filter.pcb.
2 elements could not be found. So filter.pcb is incomplete.
Next step:
Run pcb on your file filter.pcb.
Anyway Stuart, thanks for the improvements, and I should sit down and go
over gsch2pcb and look for other areas that can be improved sometime
soon. But for now, yes please, go ahead and put these changes into
gEDA CVS as I don't have access.
Bill
gsch2pcb-diff
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