gerbonara/docs/index.rst

Welcome to gerbonara's documentation!
=====================================

Gerbonara is a library to read, modify and write PCB manufacturing files such as Gerber, Excellon and IPC-356 through a
pythonic API. Gerbonara can open a folder of manufacturing files, and parse file names and metadata to figure out which
file contains what. Gerbonara is tested using an extensive library of real-world example files from CAD tools including
KiCAD, Altium, Eagle, Allegro, gEDA, Fritzing, Siemens/Mentor Graphics PADS, and Target3001!.

Gerbonara's API is built on two principles:

**Meaningful, object-oriented API**
    Gerbonara abstracts away the details of the underlying file format such as tool indices, coordinate notation and
    graphical state, and presents meaningful "graphical objects" such as a :py:class:`~primitives.Line`,
    :py:class:`~primitives.Arc`, or :py:class:`.Region` through its API. These objects can be easily created,
    manipulated or deleted from code without breaking anything else. You can even copy graphical objects between files,
    and Gerbonara will automatically convert coordinate format, units etc. for you. :py:class:`.GerberFile` and
    :py:class:`.ExcellonFile` use the same types of :doc:`graphic objects <object-api>`, so objects can be directly
    copied between file types without conversion.

**Unit-safety**
    Gerbonara embeds physical :py:class:`.LengthUnit` information in all objects. The high-level API such as
    :py:meth:`.LayerStack.merge` or :py:meth:`.GerberFile.offset` accepts arguments with an explicitly given unit and
    automatically converts them as needed. Objects can be copied between :py:class:`.GerberFile` instances and unit
    conversion will be handled transparently in the background.

Gerbonara was started as an extensive refactoring of the pcb-tools_ and pcb-tools-extension_ packages. Both of these
have statement-based APIs, that is, they parse input files into one python object for every line in the file. This means
that when saving files they can recreate the input file almost byte by byte, but manipulating a file by changing
statements without breaking things is *hard*.

Gerbonara powers gerbolyze_, a tool for converting SVG_ vector graphics files into Gerber, and embedding SVG_ into
existing Gerber files exported from a normal PCB tool for artistic purposes.

Features
========

 * File I/O
   * Gerber, Excellon (drill file), IPC-356 (netlist) read and write
   * supports file-level operations: offset, rotate, merge for all file types
 * Modification API (:py:class:`GraphicObject`)
 * Rendering API (:py:class:`GraphicPrimitive`)
 * SVG export
 * Full aperture macro support, including transformations (offset, rotation)

.. toctree::
    :maxdepth: 2
    :caption: Contents:

    cli
    api-concepts
    file-api
    object-api
    apertures
    aperture-macros
    graphic-primitive-api
    utilities

Quick Start
===========

First, install gerbonara from PyPI using pip:

.. code-block:: shell

   pip install --user gerbonara

Then, you are ready to read and write gerber files:

.. code-block:: python

    from gerbonara import LayerStack

    stack = LayerStack.from_directory('output/gerber')
    w, h = stack.outline.size('mm')
    print(f'Board size is {w:.1f} mm x {h:.1f} mm')

Command-Line Interface
======================

Gerbonara comes with a :ref:`built-in command-line interface<cli-doc>` that has functions for analyzing, rendering,
modifying, and merging Gerber files. To access it, use either the ``gerbonara`` command that is part of the python
package, or run ``python -m gerbonara``. For a list of functions or help on their usage, you can use:

.. code:: console

   $ python -m gerbonara --help
   [...]
   $ python -m gerbonara render --help

Development
===========

Gerbonara is developed on Gitlab under the gerbolyze org:

https://gitlab.com/gerbolyze/gerbonara/

A mirror of the repository can be found at:

https://git.jaseg.de/gerbonara

Our issue tracker is also on Gitlab:

https://gitlab.com/gerbolyze/gerbonara/-/issues

A copy of this documentation can also be found at gitlab:

https://gerbolyze.gitlab.io/gerbonara/

With Gerbonara, we aim to support as many different format variants as possible. If you have a file that Gerbonara can't
open, please file an issue on our issue tracker. Even if Gerbonara can open all your files, for regression testing we
are very interested in example files generated by any CAD or CAM tool that is not already on the list of supported
tools.

Supported CAD Tools
===================

Compatibility with the output of these CAD tools is tested as part of our test suite using example files generated by
these tools. Note that not all of these tools come with default Gerber file naming rules, so YMMV if your Gerbers use
some non-standard naming convention.

 * Allegro
 * Altium
 * Diptrace
 * Eagle
 * EasyEDA
 * Fritzing
 * gEDA
 * KiCAD
 * pcb-rnd
 * Siemens / Mentor Graphics Xpedition
 * Siemens PADS
 * Target 3001!
 * Upverter
 * Zuken CR-8000

Indices and tables
==================

* :ref:`genindex`
* :ref:`modindex`
* :ref:`search`

.. _pcb-tools: https://github.com/opiopan/pcb-tools-extension
.. _pcb-tools-extension: https://github.com/curtacircuitos/pcb-tools/issues
.. _gerbolyze: https://github.com/jaseg/gerbolyze
.. _SVG: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scalable_Vector_Graphics