Hi John, On Tue, Aug 16, 2011 at 10:07 PM, John Hudak <jjhu...@gmail.com> wrote: > Thank you Stephen. > When you say 'others rely on them'..Why do they rely on them? I get > the feeling that there is some feature or property that some ppl find > important enough to use them (over the other libraries).
M4 footprints are macros - each one describes a family of footprints. For example one M4 footprint can describe a whole family of footprints such as the DIP family. When the macro is called you just specify how many pins - so calling the macro with value 8 gives you an 8 pin DIP package, calling it with 14 gives you a 14 pin DIP package etc. M4 is not essential - it's still possible to manually belt out DIP8, DIP14, DIP16, etc instead. > My first attempt at creating symbols is with DJboxsym. It was > successful but the second two bullet points at the website made for > more questions without answers that could possibly throw up roadblocks > further down the road: > 1. symbols are in my "compromise' format......ummmm HOW compromised? > What is compromised? I don't know what compromise DJ is referring to. It doesn't matter though - DJ has defined a simple text format that DJboxsym converts into a symbol. Once it has been converted to a symbol you can work with it just like any other symbol - it is not 'compromised' in any way. > 2. No DRC support (use my sym2/csv2sym programs for that). What the > heck is DRC (not spelled out anywhere - first rule in writing a > document that I learned in grade school was ALWAYS spell out an acronym > the first time it is used), and now I need another special program that > does what??? And how does it alter the route to attaining my goal?? DRC = Design Rule Check. For a schematic typical DRCs include checks for unconnected pins and for shorted nets (eg GND shorted to VCC) Computerised DRC is not essential but rather a useful aid. The old school (pen & paper) way to achieve DRC is to have another engineer look through a print out of your schematic and check for errors. DRC programs aid this task by automatically detecting some simple but common mistakes and drawing your attention to them. > As an enduser, I personally don't care if it is written in perl, > python, pascal, smalltalk, lisp, algol68 or Cray Fortran. As a > developer, it may be important. > As a result, thinking that there is something 'non-native' in this > approach, I looked for others. > BTW, the link does not work - Wireshark informs me that the route is > established but does not respond..time out error. You can use a cached copy: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:http://vivara.net/cgi-bin/djboxsym.cgi Stephen Ecob Silicon On Inspiration Sydney Australia www.sioi.com.au _______________________________________________ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user