On 05/08/2014 02:18 PM, Dick Hollenbeck wrote: > On 05/08/2014 01:31 PM, John Beard wrote: >> On 08/05/14 15:53, Dick Hollenbeck wrote: >>> >>>> That's exactly what I mean - older versions of KiCad should be able to >>>> ignore, but retain, unknown data. >>> >>> This sentence has two concepts in it. One is fools gold, the other is >>> poorly expressed. >>> >>> 1) An older kicad should load a data file that is has never seen before. >> >> Is this fools' gold? A PDF reader from 2005 would probably still load a >> PDF made by newer software, even if there are new features it cannot >> understand. It might say "You can't see the embedded 4D MegaContent >> (TM), upgrade to a version that support PDF spec v5.6 for that", but >> it will show you what it can. You'd be annoyed if it didn't, it would be >> like Flash needing the latest version to watch your video, without the >> excuse that is necessary to implement the latest and greatest DRM fad. >> >>> The motivation should be that you want the flexibility to solve a specific >>> problem. >> >> The motivation is that I want the flexibility to add a field to a >> .kicad_mod file, that still allows someone else to read the footprint, >> if they don't *need* to know about that field. Currently, that will >> cause THROW_PARSE_ERROR(), and they get nothing. >> >>> But it should not name future proofing as the motivation, because you don't >>> want to >>> upgrade. That's the part that gives me conceptual grief. >> >> It's not because *I* don't want to upgrade, *I'm* to the one who's >> hypothetically extended some aspect of the footprint format for my own >> ends. It's because J. Random McTrunkBuild (or even his cousin, >> McDistroVersion) shouldn't need to recompile with a patch from me to >> read a footprint of mine which has my field "(user_sku 45443)" or >> "(jedec_ref "SOT45")" in it, when he doesn't need or care about that >> field. >> >> The current state is there no way for people (not intimately familiar >> with the .kicad_mod format) downloading a footprint now to know if it's >> compatible with their KiCad without loading the footprint and then >> guessing that the "Expected...." message means the footprint contains >> unknown fields, as opposed to being malformed. >> >> Forced recompiles are only free if your time is worthless and any >> problems caused by running bleeding-edge PCB software in production >> environments have zero cost. > > > Submit a patch. > > Hope it gets accepted.
Since your interest is limited to the *.kicad_mod file. You can use the mentioned DOM parser in your rewrite of the KICAD_PLUGIN::Footprint*() functions. Please include comparative benchmarks with your patch submission. If there's no appreciable performance hit, then you have a chance getting the patch accepted. _______________________________________________ Mailing list: https://launchpad.net/~kicad-developers Post to : kicad-developers@lists.launchpad.net Unsubscribe : https://launchpad.net/~kicad-developers More help : https://help.launchpad.net/ListHelp