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Memory for ULPs

hbridge99

If people are going to write more elaborate ULPs, it will be necessary for users to get some access to memory. In particular it would be handy and easy to have some static memory for callbacks to dialog boxes, graphic material etc

 

Also Danny  Damhave who wrote the useful (and missing functionality) in the Align ULP, mentioned that encryption for user licenses should be a feature of ULPs, so authors can sell them and recover some of the time they spend developing and debugging increasingly elaborate ones. It would also be nice for Eagle to bring some of this functionality under the roof and standardize the interfaces etc. Buying the best ones or at least throwing some licenses at authors would be nice to see.

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  • I have run out of memory creating scripts with ULPs, so it would be nice to have more (or dynamically allocated?) memory available for that.  In the meantime, you can write and read files...

     

    Sounds like what you're talking about is an extention architecture like audio VSTs or Photoshop plugins.  Probably a good thing...

  • in reply to AnalogNotes

    I wrote some Photoshop plugins in a previous lifetime and the interface there is a lot closer to the machine. Basically you have a blank check to read and write files and ask for as much memory as the machine has. This was a long time ago (mid 90's) so things may have tightened up with security etc since then. Of course it's all a tradeoff, you had to do a lot more your own (there was a great SDK though). It really does look like CadSoft spent a lot of time holding people's hands with the ULP language. There are probably more ULPs because of it, but of course it's hard to compare what that time might have bought in terms of just coding a better product.

     

    Still at least some people will write cool stuff for Eagle if Eagle wants to keep going with the plugin idea. Users are going to fill in what they want to see, and are not getting. I just blew off three days getting up to speed (just a bit) in the ULP language and put a dialog front end on an existing ULP. It works, it's useful and fun to play with, but some floating palettes in the nature of photoshop palettes would be way more functional. Or even on screen functionality of the same type.

     

    I'm not sure what package the BeagleBoard was designed in, but I witnessed another engineer with the design open in a demo of the CAD package. You could move a trace and the entire 7 layer board would reroute itself before your eyes - it was a very compelling sight.

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  • in reply to AnalogNotes

    I wrote some Photoshop plugins in a previous lifetime and the interface there is a lot closer to the machine. Basically you have a blank check to read and write files and ask for as much memory as the machine has. This was a long time ago (mid 90's) so things may have tightened up with security etc since then. Of course it's all a tradeoff, you had to do a lot more your own (there was a great SDK though). It really does look like CadSoft spent a lot of time holding people's hands with the ULP language. There are probably more ULPs because of it, but of course it's hard to compare what that time might have bought in terms of just coding a better product.

     

    Still at least some people will write cool stuff for Eagle if Eagle wants to keep going with the plugin idea. Users are going to fill in what they want to see, and are not getting. I just blew off three days getting up to speed (just a bit) in the ULP language and put a dialog front end on an existing ULP. It works, it's useful and fun to play with, but some floating palettes in the nature of photoshop palettes would be way more functional. Or even on screen functionality of the same type.

     

    I'm not sure what package the BeagleBoard was designed in, but I witnessed another engineer with the design open in a demo of the CAD package. You could move a trace and the entire 7 layer board would reroute itself before your eyes - it was a very compelling sight.

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  • in reply to hbridge99

    If I were in charge (not likely to ever happen!) I would change EAGLE to combine the scripting and the user language into one, or at least turn it into a library of functions that could be called by some particular language (Python, Ruby, Javascript, VBscript, whatever), and instead of these stupid XML files, I would prefer to use some kind of database (probably sqlite, which creates a single standalone file)...

     

    I think the Beagleboard was designed with OrCAD.  I don't know about you, but I'll take EAGLE's more limited functions along with it's SIGNIFICANTLY lower price...!