Index: work/bomtool/plan5.txt
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+1. overview: bommap data
+
+There are bommap files in a bommap library. A bommap file is identified by
+its name and contains an arbitrary number of attribute edit instructions,
+typically adding vendor-specific attributes (such as part numbers or
+ordering numbers). The file may also contain tags that are not added
+in the output but helps in GUI-searching bommap files.
+
+Bommap files may be automatically generated and/or updated by 3rd party
+(user provided) scripts downloading and processing vendor databases.
+
+In sch-rnd the bommap symbol attribute is loaded with the file name of
+a bommap file. There may be gui plugins to help the user search the
+bommap library.
+
+2. overview: bommap mechanism
+
+Before ordering parts or uploading the bom file for p&p, instead of directly
+exporting the bom from pcb-rnd, the user runs the bom tool naming a bom
+export template.
+
+The bom tool automatically calls pcb-rnd to export the bom in a file
+format that's easy to parse. This is the intermediate bom. Optionally
+the bom tool also loads a list of refdes->bommap overrides from a text file.
+After parsing the intermediate bom and the override file, it looks up the
+bommap file for each refdes. Then it runs pcb-rnd again (in the background)
+to load the board, change subcircuit attributes as instructed by the bommaps
+then exports the board into the final bom file using the output bom format
+specified on the command line.
+