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Date:	Tue, 10 Jul 2012 06:22:22 -0700
From:	Colin D Bennett <colin AT gibibit DOT com>
To:	geda-user AT delorie DOT com
Subject:	Re: [geda-user] gerber export - outline layer
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On Sun, 8 Jul 2012 00:19:54 -0400
Nathan Stewart <therealnathanstewart AT gmail DOT com> wrote:

> After beating my head against the wall trying to get my outline to
> work, I discovered that the gerber export doesn't actually export
> the outline layer as such unless it is in a group by itself.
> 
>      else if (nlayers == 1
>  459                && (strcmp (PCB->Data->Layer[idx].Name,
> "route") == 0 || 460                    strcmp
> (PCB->Data->Layer[idx].Name, "outline") == 0)) 461         {
>  462           suff = "oln";
>  463         }
> 
> It looks quite on purpose, but doesn't seem to be documented
> anywhere. Is this correct behavior?

Again we see that the pcb terminology of "layer groups" containing
one or more "layers" is biting someone.

Unless you have a good reason to do otherwise, always put
exactly one layer in each layer group.

Let's all pretend that these concepts are called "layers" and
"sublayers" to make it clear which is the fundamental one.  It has
been proposed that we call them "board layers" and "drawing layers"
or something like that, but I'm not really satisfied with that
since it should be completely clear from the name which is the
top-level entity.  Actually if we could use a word other than
"layer" for these sublayers it would be best.  I know that graphics
and drawing programs use "layer" in general but it causes confusion
since PCBs already use this term in a very specific way.  What
other word could replace "layer"?

Anyway, I've found that the current "sublayers" (simply "layers" in
current pcb terminology) are seldom useful, since you can't show or
hide specific layers in a layer group, and there are no useful
per-layer properties (except color) that can be set.  I thought it
would be useful to help separate the ground flood polygons on the
bottom of a 2-layer board from the ground traces, but the only real
benefit is that you can assign a different display color to it.

Regards,
Colin

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