Re: gEDA-user: Open Source mechanical CAD on the horizon
On Tue, 2010-03-09 at 16:54 -0800, Dave N6NZ wrote: On Mar 9, 2010, at 4:01 PM, DJ Delorie wrote: is that true? Is it simply generated on the fly off the pad information during gerber export? That's true. Just in case anyone is confused by the tight snippage: It is true that there is no real paste layer, it is generated on the fly off the pad information. OK, so... for a long time, I've been thinking about how to add refined paste information. My approach would be: 0. Extend the lexer and parser to warn and ignore on unrecognized keywords in footprints. This allows some backwards compatibility of pcb with new footprint keywords, although at the expense of error checking. Maybe should have a 'strict' option to cause an error. 1. Extend footprints to include a paste (...) keyword that looks pretty much like the 'pad() keyword. 2. If paste() doesn't exist for a footprint, synthesize one from the pad() information. That way, old footprints work just as they do now. 3. Add a paste layer to carry around the paste() information through all the translation/rotation of the symbol. 0, 1, and 2 I think I can sort out relatively easily. I have no idea how to add a layer and do all the necessary updates for footprint relocation. -dave I can imagine two options for file-Save time: 1. Adding an internal flag to state whether the paste information has been derived from the pad, or loaded from the file. In the derived case, we could skip re-saving the paste layer. (This works nicely if we decided to have some setting to specify a shrink between pad and paste.. it would allow the shrink setting to stay editable (and update the board) for non-manually modified pads. 2. Just save paste() layer information each time. This does, however mean that the paste is stuck in stone with the rest of the footprint when it is placed. Perhaps not such a bad thing. Questions though.. What to do with a manually defined paste layer if the user fiddles with the size of the copper pad / solder mask? (Assuming that eventually becomes more flexible to edit). Solder mask aperture is important as well as pad size, since the stencil opening probably ought never include areas which are solder-masked. It is possible (although I'm not sure how useful) to set a partially masked pad - perhaps as some kind of heat-sink for a transistor, with a defined mask opening. Regards, -- Peter Clifton Electrical Engineering Division, Engineering Department, University of Cambridge, 9, JJ Thomson Avenue, Cambridge CB3 0FA Tel: +44 (0)7729 980173 - (No signal in the lab!) Tel: +44 (0)1223 748328 - (Shared lab phone, ask for me) ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: Open Source mechanical CAD on the horizon
On Tue, Mar 09, 2010 at 11:33:11PM +, Peter Clifton wrote: On Tue, 2010-03-09 at 18:27 -0500, Dan McMahill wrote: pstoedit converts postscript to various formats. So I suppose you could try pcb export to postscript and then pstoedit to produce dxf. That said, there are always issues with file conversions and I suspect you're much better off letting pcb directly produce dxf. But it may just work. NB: The code being talked about is DXF - PCB outline... not PCB-DXF. It seems that we now have _three_ people who have independently written such a tool. I guess this suggests people are wishing to design boards which fit in a given mechanical envelope, as exported from a mech.-cad package. In my case, it is just the opposite, I build the enclosure around the constraints of the circuit (high frequency). I wanted to attach a photo, but it's 1.7MB, which is a bit heavy for the mailing list, I believe. Gabriel ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: Open Source mechanical CAD on the horizon
On Tue, Mar 09, 2010 at 07:56:42PM -0500, DJ Delorie wrote: One of my long-term projects is to add layer types to layers, and allow for sub-circuits (i.e. elements). Then we'd have a true paste layer, and you could define elements as complexly as you need. But it's been on the list for a long time, and hasn't happened yet :-( Indeed, however how hard would it be to add a nopaste flag to a pad to indicate that you don't want paste for this specific pad? An example would be for very large pads, where you would want to define a partially filled pad (a grid) later on the paste layer. And while we are at it adding a paste shrink parameter for middle sized pads, where you typically want a paste area somewhat smaller than the pad itself. Gabriel ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
I submitted a patch for PCB about a month ago and it has been reviewed these days; is this too much delay? Probably not, but now I read that including tests would have made the reviewing job easier and possibly shorter. But I didn't even know of the existence of such tests: the point is that to the non-developers nothing is obvious; I had already posted the code on the mailing list, but it took me several months to discover the submit patch procedure. If only there was a quick tutorial on how to do these kind of operations I think the number of developers (or at least reviewers) would grow substantially. Do you lose time because people don't post links? Well, write it down so people will know how to correctly report a bug. Also some very basic document about the internal structure of PCB is needed; think about what it takes for a novice to locate the code that he needs to change; without advice he will probably desist, and that is a potential developer lost. No wonder there are only a handful of active developers. I know that writing documentation is not fun and takes time, but for a project of this complexity it is critical to attract more people, and I think in the long run it has even a better return than coding. Alberto ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
gEDA-user: solder paste output (was: Open Source mech)
Peter Clifton wrote: On Tue, 2010-03-09 at 16:54 -0800, Dave N6NZ wrote: On Mar 9, 2010, at 4:01 PM, DJ Delorie wrote: is that true? Is it simply generated on the fly off the pad information during gerber export? That's true. I have no idea how to add a layer and do all the necessary updates for footprint relocation. I can imagine two options for file-Save time: 1. Adding an internal flag to state whether the paste information has been derived from the pad, or loaded from the file. Gabriel Paubert wrote: flag to a pad to indicate that you don't want paste a partially filled pad (a grid) later on the paste layer. And while we are at it adding a paste shrink parameter for middle sized pads Saving the paste info as two kinds, pad derived or user spec'd, seems the way to be able to use it. Then you can generate a layer that shows user spec'd and a separate layer showing derived solder paste. Then you could turn display of them off and on to get it straight. Or the (wished for) layers could go into one of those (wished for) 3D-layer-via-stackup views. I imagine a plugin aid to drawing solder paste grid patterns that are independent of footprints. Same plugin would be nice for creating footprints that contain grid patterns. I don't even have the economic freedom to be a second class developer doing bug triage for now though. Maybe next year if my plans go. John -- Ecosensory Austin TX ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: solder paste output (was: Open Source mech)
I was thinking of a post-processing script. For each footprint you would look up to see if there was a corresponding stencil footprint (maybe a .sfp file). If there was that would be used. If not then a rule would be applied to create the pattern. You could have specific rules for groups of components and a default rule. Another step added to the makefile. (* jcl *) -- You can't create open hardware with closed EDA tools. twitter: http://twitter.com/jluciani blog:http://www.luciani.org ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: Open Source mechanical CAD on the horizon
Indeed, however how hard would it be to add a nopaste flag to a pad to indicate that you don't want paste for this specific pad? Only as hard as running the ChangePaste() action. ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: Open Source mechanical CAD on the horizon
Indeed, however how hard would it be to add a nopaste flag to a pad to indicate that you don't want paste for this specific pad? Only as hard as running the ChangePaste() action. ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
I totally agree with you (as a new user interested in developing). 2010/3/10 Alberto Maccioni [1]alberto.macci...@gmail.com I submitted a patch for PCB about a month ago and it has been reviewed these days; is this too much delay? Probably not, but now I read that including tests would have made the reviewing job easier and possibly shorter. But I didn't even know of the existence of such tests: the point is that to the non-developers nothing is obvious; I had already posted the code on the mailing list, but it took me several months to discover the submit patch procedure. If only there was a quick tutorial on how to do these kind of operations I think the number of developers (or at least reviewers) would grow substantially. Do you lose time because people don't post links? Well, write it down so people will know how to correctly report a bug. Also some very basic document about the internal structure of PCB is needed; think about what it takes for a novice to locate the code that he needs to change; without advice he will probably desist, and that is a potential developer lost. No wonder there are only a handful of active developers. I know that writing documentation is not fun and takes time, but for a project of this complexity it is critical to attract more people, and I think in the long run it has even a better return than coding. Alberto ___ geda-user mailing list [2]geda-u...@moria.seul.org [3]http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user References 1. mailto:alberto.macci...@gmail.com 2. mailto:geda-user@moria.seul.org 3. http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: Open Source mechanical CAD on the horizon
On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 10:13:16AM -0500, DJ Delorie wrote: Indeed, however how hard would it be to add a nopaste flag to a pad to indicate that you don't want paste for this specific pad? Only as hard as running the ChangePaste() action. I wasn't aware of its existence. Gabriel ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: Open Source mechanical CAD on the horizon
On Mar 10, 2010, at 4:24 AM, Peter Clifton wrote: Questions though.. What to do with a manually defined paste layer if the user fiddles with the size of the copper pad / solder mask? (Assuming that eventually becomes more flexible to edit). ? I don't think I understand the question. Are you asking what to do if the user is editing pads and masks inside of a placed footprint inside PCB? I think the answer is, if the user wants to change the solder mask, he fiddles that, too. Solder mask aperture is important as well as pad size, since the stencil opening probably ought never include areas which are solder-masked. It is possible (although I'm not sure how useful) to set a partially masked pad - perhaps as some kind of heat-sink for a transistor, with a defined mask opening. There is such a thing as a mask defined pad where the copper is larger than the mask aperture, and the mask aperture is what defines the effective size of the pad. In that case, the stencil should be the smaller of pad or mask aperture. I've never built a board that way, FWIW. Heat sinks are an interesting case. First off, the pad might be much larger than the device tab. The whole thing will be unmasked. But it probably wants a pattern of a few dots of solder on it, not a giant puddle. The problems I am trying to solve in my particular case are: 1. In some cases, heuristics have no chance what so ever of deriving the mask that I want from the pad layer. So I want to specify it precisely in a footprint file and not have any tool do any underhanded automatic tweaks to it, ever. 2. My personal technology for homebrew stencils has limitations that require modifications to the current paste layer that are not easily programmed into an automated tool. Again, I just want to say it once in a footprint file, and no tool should ever try to out guess that. -dave ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 5:06 PM, Dan McMahill d...@mcmahill.net wrote: Here's an example of a place where extra help wouldn't have needed any knowledge of internals. Over the years there have been various bug reports about some of the footprints that ship with pcb. For each of those, the process becomes Since footprint bugs take so long, maybe some triage is necessary. I think it make sense for you developers to make a footprint category, plop all of these in there and concentrate on pruning the list of bugs that require a developer to handle. (I agree with the idea that has been posted here before that a symbol/footprint/model/etc. library for gEDA should be a separate project altogether) I think it would help to organize the bugs in there. Currently there are 140 open bugs, most without a category, no groups used, and all priority 5. I can imagine for a developer it just looks like a mountain of sludge that would take a lunch break just to start on something. The tracker would probably be more useful and thus used more if it were more manageable. Well defined categories, groups and priorities would go a long way. Given access I'll try to make some time start trudging through and cleaning the trackers up, but can't do much myself as is. Another example is when a new HID is added. Almost no existing code is touched. However, it needs to be built. Code needs to be checked for formatting (run through indent(3)), compiler warnings checked, basic Does PCB and/or gEDA have a coding style preference, let alone one documented somewhere? author didn't provide that, etc. I spent probably 2 hours today (my entire lunch and a chunk of my evening) on a single patch submission to get it to where I didn't feel bad about it. At this rate, it would take me a month of And now PCB has a gcode exporter. Sweet! :) full time work to get through the bug and patch database I went ahead and did it on this one, but in general, it would have been useful to have extra hands to do some of these checks and to help out the author (whose work I really appreciate, this email is not meant to complain since he put in a lot of work already). ... so for the patches that you can't put so much time into, just a comment to say what needs to be done before it gets applied would go a long way. The submitter has most likely spent enough time on the patch that they probably won't mind spending another hour or two doing the necessary grunt work to get it included in the main repository. Jared ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 5:14 AM, Alberto Maccioni alberto.macci...@gmail.com wrote: the code on the mailing list, but it took me several months to discover the submit patch procedure. What procedure did you find? Jared ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: PCB Bugmail
On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 2:09 PM, Peter Clifton pc...@cam.ac.uk wrote: Or - in my ideal word, can we just dump the crappy sourceforge bug trackers and switch to Launchpad??? (Pretty please). What are the chances of installing something like flyspray, bugzilla, or even redmine or trac, on gpleda.org? Would that be substantially better than SF or Launchpad? (I don't have a lot of experience with them, but the projects I've seen that do host their own issue tracker it sure works/looks better) Jared ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
gEDA-user: simulating power mosfets
I'm trying to simulate my first nontrivial circuit with ngspice. The circuit in question is a discrete MOSFET driver. I wasn't able to find any spice models for the power MOSFETs I'm using (Ixys IXTP200N055T2), but I was able to find something from Fairchild for a similar device, FDP032N08. The trouble (besides not being experienced with spice) I'm having is that the model from Fairchild is actually a subcircuit, and I'm not entirely sure how to structure my schematic such that gnetlist will make the right output. I'm running it as gnetlist -g spice-sdb hbridge.sch Best I can tell, as long as the refdes attribute starts with Q then it will be netlisted as Qfoo, which means spice won't be expecting a subcircuit. I think (although I'm having a hard time finding the right manual to read) that the identifier in the spice input must start with X to reference a subcircuit. I thought maybe I could change the refdes to start with X in the schematic (although I'd rather keep it as Q), but then the netlister outputs QXfoo. I'm thinking this is because my symbol has an attribute device=NMOS_TRANSISTOR. So, I'm left with a couple broad questions: - Is there some combination of attributes I should set on my symbol so that the netlister will use the subcircuit? - Is there a simpler way I should go about this? For now I'm mostly interested in what my driver can do to the gate of the MOSFET, and for now less about what the MOSFETs do to their load (a DC motor). ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: PCB Bugmail
On Wed, 10 Mar 2010 10:15:41 -0800, Jared Casper jaredcas...@gmail.com wrote: On Mon, Mar 8, 2010 at 2:09 PM, Peter Clifton pc...@cam.ac.uk wrote: Or - in my ideal word, can we just dump the crappy sourceforge bug trackers and switch to Launchpad??? (Pretty please). What are the chances of installing something like flyspray, bugzilla, or even redmine or trac, on gpleda.org? Would that be substantially better than SF or Launchpad? (I don't have a lot of experience with them, but the projects I've seen that do host their own issue tracker it sure works/looks better) It's been discussed before. http://archives.seul.org/geda/dev/Oct-2008/msg00139.html Peter -- Peter Brett pe...@peter-b.co.uk Remote Sensing Research Group Surrey Space Centre ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: PCB Bugmail
On Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:12:20 +, Peter TB Brett wrote: It's been discussed before. http://archives.seul.org/geda/dev/Oct-2008/msg00139.html Before I read the whole thread: What was the upshot of this discussion? ---(kaimartin)--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak tel: +49-511-762-2895 Universität Hannover, Inst. für Quantenoptik fax: +49-511-762-2211 Welfengarten 1, 30167 Hannover http://www.iqo.uni-hannover.de GPG key:http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?search=Knaak+kmkop=get ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: PCB Bugmail
On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 10:43 AM, Kai-Martin Knaak k...@familieknaak.de wrote: On Wed, 10 Mar 2010 18:12:20 +, Peter TB Brett wrote: It's been discussed before. http://archives.seul.org/geda/dev/Oct-2008/msg00139.html Oh yeah, I remember reading that now, thanks. :) But revisiting the topic once every year or so doesn't seem too bad, what was true then may not still be true. Before I read the whole thread: What was the upshot of this discussion? I think it boils down to this one from Ales: http://archives.seul.org/geda/dev/Oct-2008/msg00147.html There needs to be a very good reason to go through the hassle of hosting it on gpleda.org. Multiple gEDA projects willing to consolidate to one system on gpleda.org seemed like it would do it, but tough to put together. Time for maintenance, compute resources, and single-point of failure were an issue. Maybe it makes sense to have another machine and person run tracker.gpleda.org? Moving to some other hosting site like Google code or something was deemed acceptable, but there wasn't one that was clearly so much better than sourceforge that it would be worth it. Jared ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: PCB Bugmail
On Tue, Mar 9, 2010 at 7:00 AM, Peter Clifton pc...@cam.ac.uk wrote: I don't think PCB has a mailing list for bug traffic. It does now: http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/pcb-bugs Dan set it up a couple days ago. Long ago there was a PCB specific list but I've not seen any messages on it in *years*, I doubt it even still exists. ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
I called it a procedure, but it's the fact that there is a submit patch function; it's so obvious to any developer that it's not written anywhere. And I didn't notice it until very recently. 2010/3/10 Jared Casper jaredcas...@gmail.com: On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 5:14 AM, Alberto Maccioni alberto.macci...@gmail.com wrote: the code on the mailing list, but it took me several months to discover the submit patch procedure. What procedure did you find? Jared ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
Yes - but what is the function!?! (A,B,C; 1,2,3 please.) On 03/10/2010 03:07 PM, Alberto Maccioni wrote: I called it a procedure, but it's the fact that there is a submit patch function; it's so obvious to any developer that it's not written anywhere. And I didn't notice it until very recently. 2010/3/10 Jared Casperjaredcas...@gmail.com: On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 5:14 AM, Alberto Maccioni alberto.macci...@gmail.com wrote: the code on the mailing list, but it took me several months to discover the submit patch procedure. What procedure did you find? Jared ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: Open Source mechanical CAD on the horizon
On Mar 10, 2010, at 4:24 AM, Peter Clifton wrote: Solder mask aperture is important as well as pad size, since the stencil opening probably ought never include areas which are solder-masked. It is possible (although I'm not sure how useful) to set a partially masked pad - perhaps as some kind of heat-sink for a transistor, with a defined mask opening. The unixy side is coming out in me. It sounds like we want arbitrary mask layers in the footprint. solder paste mask solder mask mask Where solder mask is a negative mask and solder paste is a positive mask Solder paste is a volumetric decision, where solder mask is area. I propose that the footprint gets a general mask statement. Mask[ type, polarity, linked name, shape, scale, shape coords... ] type - specifies what type of mask it is polarity - specifies positive or negative linked name - associates the mask to a pin or pad, used for scaling bounds. example you wouldn't scale a solder paste mask larger than a pad it was associated with. shape - specifies circular, rectangular, or polygon. scale - specifies how the mask can/should be scaled. Thoughts on scaling. volume:200pl, uses a stencil thickness specified as preference. stencil gerber gets the thickness information added. shape coordinates - depends on shape in line. circle - center and radius rectangle - opposing corners poly - list of three or more points grid - center of grid, number of columns (number across x), number of rows(number across y), grids rectangle pair others? line - endpoints and thickness Thoughts? Steve ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
This: http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=73743atid=538813 which is also linked from: http://www.gpleda.org/developer.html 2010/3/10 Ethan Swint eswint.r...@verizon.net: Yes - but what is the function!?! (A,B,C; 1,2,3 please.) On 03/10/2010 03:07 PM, Alberto Maccioni wrote: I called it a procedure, but it's the fact that there is a submit patch function; it's so obvious to any developer that it's not written anywhere. And I didn't notice it until very recently. 2010/3/10 Jared Casperjaredcas...@gmail.com: On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 5:14 AM, Alberto Maccioni alberto.macci...@gmail.com wrote: the code on the mailing list, but it took me several months to discover the submit patch procedure. What procedure did you find? Jared ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 12:18 PM, Alberto Maccioni alberto.macci...@gmail.com wrote: This: http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=73743atid=538813 which is also linked from: http://www.gpleda.org/developer.html Ah yes... unfortunately, at present, Sourceforge is where patches go to die*. I've had more success getting patches applied by emailing them to this list then posting them there, even though that is the preferred method according to the website. Hopefully that'll change and eventually a standard, actually used, procedure for community contributions will arise out of all of this (be it sourceforge or not). Jared *http://archives.seul.org/geda/user/Oct-2009/msg00258.html ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
On Wednesday 10 March 2010 20:26:41 Jared Casper wrote: On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 12:18 PM, Alberto Maccioni alberto.macci...@gmail.com wrote: This: http://sourceforge.net/tracker/?group_id=73743atid=538813 which is also linked from: http://www.gpleda.org/developer.html Ah yes... unfortunately, at present, Sourceforge is where patches go to die*. I've had more success getting patches applied by emailing them to this list then posting them there, even though that is the preferred method according to the website. Hopefully that'll change and eventually a standard, actually used, procedure for community contributions will arise out of all of this (be it sourceforge or not). We (Peter C I) try quite hard to keep on top of patches to gschem/libgeda etc., y'know. Putting them in the tracker makes things a lot easier for us, and I really encourage you to keep doing that. Peter -- Peter Brett pe...@peter-b.co.uk Remote Sensing Research Group Surrey Space Centre signature.asc Description: This is a digitally signed message part. ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
On Wed, Mar 10, 2010 at 12:52 PM, Peter TB Brett pe...@peter-b.co.uk wrote: We (Peter C I) try quite hard to keep on top of patches to gschem/libgeda etc., y'know. Putting them in the tracker makes things a lot easier for us, and I really encourage you to keep doing that. Sorry, didn't mean to diminish your efforts, I appreciate it. As shown by the g-code patch, it does work on occasion. Just pointing out that as is putting a patch on sourceforge is no guarantee it will be seen. (the ... go to die quote was quoting Peter C). Jared ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: rant: pcb print from command line
On Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:11:08 -0500, Bob Paddock wrote: fwiw, there is a pcb-bugs mailing list with only me as the subscriber. Of course in all fairness, that list didn't exist yesterday ;) That list will get all new bug reports and updates to existing reports. Don't see it listed at any of these seemingly likely places: http://www.gpleda.org/mailinglists.html http://pcb.gpleda.org/bugs.html If these pages were part of the wiki, no valuable developer time would be needed to keep them up to date. ---(kaimartin)--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak Öffentlicher PGP-Schlüssel: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0x6C0B9F53 ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: simulating power mosfets
Phil Frost wrote: I'm trying to simulate my first nontrivial circuit with ngspice. The circuit in question is a discrete MOSFET driver. I wasn't able to find any spice models for the power MOSFETs I'm using (Ixys IXTP200N055T2), but I was able to find something from Fairchild for a similar device, FDP032N08. The trouble (besides not being experienced with spice) I'm having is that the model from Fairchild is actually a subcircuit, and I'm not entirely sure how to structure my schematic such that gnetlist will make the right output. I'm running it as gnetlist -g spice-sdb hbridge.sch Best I can tell, as long as the refdes attribute starts with Q then it will be netlisted as Qfoo, which means spice won't be expecting a subcircuit. I think (although I'm having a hard time finding the right manual to read) that the identifier in the spice input must start with X to reference a subcircuit. I thought maybe I could change the refdes to start with X in the schematic (although I'd rather keep it as Q), but then the netlister outputs QXfoo. I'm thinking this is because my symbol has an attribute device=NMOS_TRANSISTOR. So, I'm left with a couple broad questions: - Is there some combination of attributes I should set on my symbol so that the netlister will use the subcircuit? - Is there a simpler way I should go about this? For now I'm mostly interested in what my driver can do to the gate of the MOSFET, and for now less about what the MOSFETs do to their load (a DC motor). Since nobody has answered so far, just my 2 cents but I know neither gEDA nor ngSpice: The assumption that subcircuit refdeses have to be X is correct, at least in all the SPICE variants I have dealt with so far. If for some reason gEDA doesn't allow to switch to another refdes letter inside the schematic (which would be sort of strange because of differing preferences in various countries) you'd have to make a new part, then set it's refdes letter to X. QX won't work, usually. I bet one can fix that right in gEDA, maybe someone can shed some light. A sledgehammer method in such cases would be to do a find-replace on the netlist that swaps QX for X. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: simulating power mosfets
On Mar 11, 2010, at 7:11 AM, Joerg wrote: If for some reason gEDA doesn't allow to switch to another refdes letter inside the schematic (which would be sort of strange because of differing preferences in various countries) you'd have to make a new part, then set it's refdes letter to X. QX won't work, usually. I bet one can fix that right in gEDA, maybe someone can shed some light. The refedes renaming is in spice-sdb: it has heuristics that attempt to fix the prefix for SPICE (see sections 4.7 and 4.8 of http://www.brorson.com/gEDA/SPICE/x150.html). I personally have had more trouble with these than success, so Stuart kindly added the --nomunge option to turn the renaming off (gnetlist -g spice-sdb --nomunge ...). A sledgehammer method in such cases would be to do a find-replace on the netlist that swaps QX for X. John Doty Noqsi Aerospace, Ltd. http://www.noqsi.com/ j...@noqsi.com ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: simulating power mosfets
John Doty wrote: On Mar 11, 2010, at 7:11 AM, Joerg wrote: If for some reason gEDA doesn't allow to switch to another refdes letter inside the schematic (which would be sort of strange because of differing preferences in various countries) you'd have to make a new part, then set it's refdes letter to X. QX won't work, usually. I bet one can fix that right in gEDA, maybe someone can shed some light. The refedes renaming is in spice-sdb: it has heuristics that attempt to fix the prefix for SPICE (see sections 4.7 and 4.8 of http://www.brorson.com/gEDA/SPICE/x150.html). I personally have had more trouble with these than success, so Stuart kindly added the --nomunge option to turn the renaming off (gnetlist -g spice-sdb --nomunge ...). Aha, that seems to be it. Says in Section 4.2.: Valid values [for refdeses] depend upon the component type and are given in the appendix. Looks like the nomunge option could help Phil with the subcircuit. -- Regards, Joerg http://www.analogconsultants.com/ ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: PCB Bugmail
On Wed, 10 Mar 2010 11:04:16 -0800, Jared Casper wrote: But revisiting the topic once every year or so doesn't seem too bad, what was true then may not still be true. One of the truths of yesteryear has changed: Bugzilla now integrates with git http://www.theoldmonk.net/blog/archives/2010/03/08/gitzilla_-_git-bugzilla_integration_done_right/ Note, the date of this blog :-) There needs to be a very good reason to go through the hassle of hosting it on gpleda.org. Multiple gEDA projects willing to consolidate to one system on gpleda.org seemed like it would do it, but tough to put together. A unified bug reporting / patch submitting interface for all sub projects would indeed be helpful for clueless users like me. Time for maintenance, compute resources, and single-point of failure were an issue. Maybe it makes sense to have another machine and person run tracker.gpleda.org? ack. One of the main themes in this thread is overload of central people of the project. Logical consequence should be to delegate as many tasks to other persons rather than increase the load of one of the main developers. If I haven't overlooked something vital, buzilla does not need a root server to run on. Virtual servers with access to mysql database, pearl and python scripting and GB/month traffic got pretty cheap (~ 1.50 EUR/month). If nobody else steps forward, I might consider to donate and admin such a bugzilla server. ---(kaimartin)--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak Öffentlicher PGP-Schlüssel: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0x6C0B9F53 ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: PCB Bugmail
On Wed, 10 Mar 2010 14:04:42 -0500, Bob Paddock wrote: I don't think PCB has a mailing list for bug traffic. It does now: http://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/pcb-bugs BTW, the mailing list software of the various geda lists, mailman, does not need a root server. So, like bugzilla, the lists can easily be run on cheap, decentralized webspace. And while at it, dokuwiki is also easy to run from cheap webspace. I set up the website of my choir with wikipedia with dokuwiki ( http://johannesbrahmschor.de/jbcwiki/doku.php ) Dokuwiki has come a long way since its inception in 2004. It is a joy to administrate :-) So the wiki is another candidate task to relieve core developers from. Of course, this also means to transfer some of the power that comes with administration -- A power that must only be used to the benefit of the project. You need to trust whoever takes this job. Are you ready for this? ---(kaimartin)--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak Öffentlicher PGP-Schlüssel: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0x6C0B9F53 ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
Re: gEDA-user: documentation -- under construction....
On Mon, 08 Mar 2010 15:53:42 +, Kai-Martin Knaak wrote: In gpleda.org the tools page lists documentation as one of the core tools of geda/gaf: http://www.gpleda.org/tools/index.html This item links to a page that merely says under construction http://www.gpleda.org/tools/docs/index.html Imagine a newbie looking for a new EDA application gets this page. Chances are, that he/she stays away from it. A few days ago someone complained on this list about absent documentation. This may be the reason. IMHO, the link on the tools page should point to http://geda.seul.org/wiki/geda:documentation ---(kaimartin)--- bump this topic up, so it does not rot unresolved in the archive. ---(kaimartin)--- -- Kai-Martin Knaak Öffentlicher PGP-Schlüssel: http://pgp.mit.edu:11371/pks/lookup?op=getsearch=0x6C0B9F53 ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
gEDA-user: gnetlist without X?
Does anybody know if it's possible to compile gnetlist (and its dependency libgeda) without gtk? From the source, it looks like gnetlist should compile fine, but libgeda has quite a few gdk references that I would have to remove. I'm trying to use gnetlist on a headless Gentoo server, and I'd rather not have to attempt installing X. The architecture is Mips, so finding a cross-compile machine will be difficult. Would it be easier to switch to using gnetman? -Alan ___ geda-user mailing list geda-user@moria.seul.org http://www.seul.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/geda-user
