| ID: | 3439 |
| From: | Mychaela Falconia <my...@gmail.com> |
| Date: | Sat, 12 Oct 2019 15:35:50 -0800 |
| Subject: | Re: [pcb-rnd] Why focus on gtk? (was: experimental windows port - |
| in-reply-to: | 3436 from ge...@igor2.repo.hu |
| replies: | 3440 from John Griessen <jo...@cibolo.com> |
Hi Igor2, > There is a slight bias: 99% of our users are using the gtk HID so we get > most of the bug reports and testing on that. This part seems to answer my main question - if the user base has an overwhelming majority preference for gtk, then I guess you are just following the user demand. > Now about lesstif. Before we go further into this: there are a lot of > debugging and development currently looking for developer hours in our > lesstif HID. Are you willing to invest 4..8 hours a week in that? If so, > we will have more progress on lesstif. If not, then are you willing to > invest money in it, paying someone to get those bugs in the lesstif HID > fixed? If no to both, then I have to ask: what do _you_ do for getting > more focus on hid_lesstif? Sorry if I was unclear - my inquiry was not a request for action, instead it was a request for information only. I just saw what looked like a contradiction to me, an apparent contraction between your overall preference for minimalism in general (which I totally share) vs. the strong preference given to the much more heavyweight and anti- minimalist HID, and I was trying to understand this apparent contradiction. Your response is the closest thing to a sensible answer that I can hope to get, so please consider my question fully answered. > If you meant the windows port: No, I wasn't talking about the Windows port at all, instead it just so happened that the thread about the Windows port was the one in which you expressed what appears to be disapproval (which I totally share) for the extreme bloat of gtk - hence I was moved to ask "if you agree with me that gtk is a gross monster, why keep giving it the coveted position of the most preferred and best-supported HID". > lesstif (motif) heavily depends on X11, and > there's no native X11 support in the windows API. OK, makes sense. > In other words: getting > motif to work _natively_ on windows is not a cross compilation work, but > real porting (partial rewrite) of the motif library for windows. If you > want to spend your time on that, go ahead Oh gawd no! No interest whatsoever in that malware OS from my side. > I went for the easier path, which was cross-compiling gtk, since gtk/gdk > does have explicit, native win32 support. OK, this part totally makes sense - you clearly took the most sensible path for the Win32 port. > The only real difference on code level is: at the moment the lesstif HID > is lagging far behind in some low level functionality. If you want it to > develop faster, you should invest in it. If the lesstif HID lags (present-time lacks) in functionality, then from the perspective of a non-developer user it is subpar. But once again, I am only seeking to improve my understanding of the present situation, I am *not* asking you or anyone else to do anything. Just seeking information and understanding, nothing more. In my current circumstances, this question and my following of pcb-rnd in general are presently on a "curiosity only" level. My long-term goal (which I have had for a few years now) is to bring into existence a FOSS PCB editor tool that can compete with PADS and Altium for the purpose of designing cellphone or cell modem boards - right now there is no FOSS tool (except maybe KiCAD which is a cultural turn-off for me) that can handle the job (neither geda-pcb nor pcb-rnd has the necessary data model), making proprietary software the only game in town. I am naturally very unhappy about being held hostage to Windows-based proprietary sw, so I very strongly desire a FOSS alternative to these proprietary tools - but because of my personal life circumstances, it will probably be another year or two before I can start working on it. When the time comes when I am ready to start working in the earnest on this project, I am afraid that I will have to make my own fork (starting from either geda-pcb or pcb-rnd, to be decided) because the kind of boards I like to build (cellular, using an early 2000s chipset) absolutely require certain features which in turn require a certain data model change that is fundamentally incompatible with the geda-pcb-originating (-rnd or not) philosophy - but because it will be another year or two before I can start working on this idea, I would rather postpone this discussion until then. > The quest for a simple and stable solution: > Long term, I plan to have an SDL2 based HID. I have to admit that I know absolutely nothing about SDL2, but you and I generally share very similar minimalist preferences, thus without knowing for certain, I am probably in agreement with you here. > Now I see having a > schematics editor is more critical than having another HID Ahh, schematics... I tried the conventional approach with graphical schematics (in gschem) for my OSDCU board back in 2006-2009 and for some very simple boards up until 2011 or so, but I found the whole concept of graphical schematics to be an incredible PITA, just creating needless extra work: not only do I have to do the job of an engineer, designing the board I wish to build, but I also have to do the job of an artist, coming up with a graphical representation of my components and interconnects. I now use the structural subset of Verilog as my design entry language, replacing graphical schematics, plus my own MCL language for capturing component data, and once I got this scheme properly working (early 2015 or so), I have never looked back. Here is the ad hoc toolkit I use: https://www.freecalypso.org/hg/ueda-linux/ It can currently generate netlist outputs in PADS and geda-pcb netlist import formats, thus I assume that it should work fine with pcb-rnd too. M~
Reply subtree:
3439 Re: [pcb-rnd] Why focus on gtk? (was: experimental windows port - from Mychaela Falconia <my...@gmail.com>
3440 [pcb-rnd] non-graphical schematics, layout (was: Why focus on gtk?) from John Griessen <jo...@cibolo.com>
3441 Re: [pcb-rnd] non-graphical schematics, layout (was: Why focus on gtk?) from Mychaela Falconia <my...@gmail.com>
3442 Re: [pcb-rnd] non-graphical schematics, layout from John Griessen <jo...@cibolo.com>