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Date: Wed, 30 Jan 2019 21:12:19 +0100 (CET)
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From: gedau AT igor2 DOT repo DOT hu
Subject: Re: [geda-user] Refdes bug or Master Attribute Document on the Wiki
needs update.
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On Wed, 30 Jan 2019, John Doty wrote:

>
>      On Jan 30, 2019, at 1:27 PM, gedau AT igor2 DOT repo DOT hu wrote:
>
>See my point? pcb-rnd is strong in that. When they can't load=C2=A0
>organization A's kicad board at organization B's protel/autotrax,
>that's=C2=A0
>where you jump in with a Makefile that uses pcb-rnd to convert. No
>sch=C2=A0
>involved. No GUI PCB editing involved. Not funneling anything in, not=C2=
=A0
>locking in users.=C2=A0
>
>
>I can see the use of that. One disadvantage, though, is that the layout
>winds up another generation removed from the controlled schematics.=20

I don't see that as a disadvantage: having options, not forcing the user=20
to follow one workflow is a feature, not a bug.

I see the benefit of a purely sch-driven flow, and we do support that too.=
=20
But other users prefer other flows, and it's not all black and white=20
either: there are a lot of in-between flows. A good tool can support=20
anything on the spectrum.

The other day I had a board where I strated with pcb-rnd and wanted to=20
export a netlist just to make it easier to see if the result made sense on=
=20
the circuit level. It's not common for me to do this workflow, but=20
occassionally happens, because in some cases this is the most efficient=20
solution. Having a tool that tells me "hey, you can't do that, you have to=
=20
draw the schematics first!" would not be an advantage for me.

In fact a potential pcb-rnd user coming from some commercial EDA had this=
=20
first question about pcb-rnd: "can I draw without a netlist?"

>Can you test netlist topology for equivalence?

In a pure, direct, netlist-oriented sense: no, as netlist is only=20
complementer info on the board, it does not exist alone in pcb-rnd - we=20
don't have tools that deal with netlists alone (beyond import/export),=20
it's always the netlist-board relation.


However, in a netlist-board relation it is possible:

1. you can load board A (that contains netlist A); you can check if the=20
board matches the netlist

2.a. you can import netlist B into that board, replacing the original=20
netlist in the board; if you then do a connection check (rats=20
optimization), you compare netlist B to board A, which (because of the=20
step 1 check) really means comparing netlist A to netlist B

2.b. you can export the current netlist from a board into a netlist file=20
you can later load again. This provides another way of doing 2.a., by=20
swapping the netlists of board A and board B with netlist exports and=20
imports

Since we are thinking in PCB terms, netlist equivalence for us means: the=
=20
two netlists have the same components with the same refdes' and the same=20
connections between the same pins of the same components. However, network=
=20
names don't have to match.

For a more abstract, more schematic-oriented netlist comparison, you'd=20
export both netlists from both boards and import them in a schematic=20
editor or drc or whatever other tool to compare them. All pcb-rnd can do=20
for this is offering netlist export that is easily accessible from both=20
CLI and GUI (and it's all done already).

So from pcb-rnd side this is possible. And this is where cooperation with=
=20
other projects and "use cases and users in the center, not code or=20
projects" come in: pcb-rnd doesn't want to be a schematic capture tool, so=
=20
this part is out of scope. Instead we want to have good cooperation with=20
schematic caputre software so we can get this work by getting our tools to=
=20
work together.

With xschem we do have this kind of cooperation and we did achieve a lot=20
in very short time. With gschem (Roland) we had a smaller version of this=
=20
for a few days - git gschem has back annotation from pcb-rnd (but it=20
didn't reach pcb-rnd users because of no release and the cooperation=20
faded). With Lepton we never had it (all my different attempts to build=20
any kind of cooperation failed and I eventually gave up).

So if you meant "why not lepton" in the sense why I am not promoting=20
lepton: because that's not my preferred tool as an user (for many reasons)=
=20
and because as a programmer I see that's not where cooperative progression=
=20
of the toolkit/ecosystem (that pcb-rnd part of) is happenning. Meanwhile I=
=20
do see it happening with xschem daily. It's an opt-in thing, I can't=20
force it.

Regards,

Igor2


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