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Date:	Wed, 7 Aug 2013 15:20:34 +0200 (CEST)
From:	Roland Lutz <rlutz AT hedmen DOT org>
To:	geda-user AT delorie DOT com
Subject:	Re: [geda-user] libgeda Python bindings?
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A short update for the Python bindings/translation:

I tried both ways (creating a Python wrapper using swig, and translating 
the relevant parts of libgeda to Python) and found it to be much more 
difficult than expected.  The main problems I experienced are:

1. The gschem GUI code is not cleanly separated from the libgeda code; in 
fact, about half of libgeda is dealing with GUI issues.

2. There is some semi-working (e.g., no arcs) support for SVG paths which 
has been implemented by copying and adapting parts of rsvg.

3. The bounding box of text objects can only be determined using the Cairo 
renderer.  (This is the main reason why libgeda has to know about TOPLEVEL 
contexts.)  Extracting this functionality from the renderer is not 
practical.

4. .sch/.sym files can only be parsed correctly after executing the 
configuration files.  (I consider this a major anti-feature.)

I'm still working an the Python issue, but with somewhat less priority. 
Maybe I'm going to remove these features at the price of compatibility; 
I'm not sure yet.

Roland

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