X-Authentication-Warning: delorie.com: mail set sender to geda-user-bounces using -f X-Recipient: geda-user AT delorie DOT com X-Sender: qpaz From: al davis To: geda-user AT delorie DOT com Subject: Re: [geda-user] Freerouting finally free (GPL3) Date: Sat, 5 Apr 2014 00:13:32 -0400 User-Agent: KMail/1.13.7 (Linux/3.2.0-4-amd64; KDE/4.8.4; x86_64; ; ) References: <1395878918 DOT 2126 DOT 7 DOT camel AT AMD64X2 DOT fritz DOT box> <1396540827 DOT 2692 DOT 20 DOT camel AT AMD64X2 DOT fritz DOT box> In-Reply-To: <1396540827.2692.20.camel@AMD64X2.fritz.box> MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: Text/Plain; charset="utf-8" Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Message-Id: <201404050013.32712.ad252@freeelectron.net> Reply-To: geda-user AT delorie DOT com On Thursday 03 April 2014, Stefan Salewski wrote: > Have you verified that the specctra format can be freely used > without legal issues? Nothing patentable there. Reverse engineer it from Freerouting code. > I was looking for format description about two years ago, > when I started my own toporouter -- and that time I found > format description only on a russian site. I think that the > owner of that format is not the big company with the broken > fruit, so risk of legal issues is not that great. But there > may be a risk still. The owner is Cadence. > In my opinion benefit of specctra format for PCB is not that > big -- do we really intent to use free tools for schematic > and PCB, and then use a commercial router? People use hybrid systems all the time. Until now, one major disadvantage of kicad was the need for a proprietary router that could only be accessed by the web. To me, that was a fatal disadvantage. That disadvantage has been replaced by an advantage. Not only does it have a non- proprietary router, it gives you a choice. > (Seems to me as > strange as using free open source tools on commercial > operating system.) I do not know something about the router > of Alfons Wirtz -- if it really is good and GPL now, it may > be possible to make it compatible with PCB data format. The router in PCB now is not that great. Using a standard format, even if only a defacto standard, allows a choice of routers and a common point between kicad and PCB. It also makes hooks for simulation easier. > (I > have to admit that I have not really big hope for his router > -- he has not worked on it in the last 5 years himself, and > I wonder if his code is really well written and documented?) You can look. It's written in Java. > An other approach may be to write a converter from PCB > format to KiCAD format, that would cover specctra format > export and at the some time the KiCad push&shove router. That's funny. Acknowledging the kicad format as standard? A better idea is to choose a common format equally native/foreign to both. If properly done it could make it possible to migrate between them which would enhance both. .. a common format used by ALL. .. that could be a migration path. For a PCB layout program to not support specctra format is a mistake almost as big as for a circuit simulator to not support SPICE format.