Kill_LIFE/specs/yiacad_git_eda_platform_spec.md

Spec - YiACAD Git-based EDA platform

Intent

Build YiACAD as an independent Git-first EDA application, with web-facing surfaces as one client lane:

• each project maps to a Git repository
• KiCad and FreeCAD design files remain the authoritative design documents inside the repository
• Excalidraw diagrams live as versioned JSON beside the EDA project
• the web product adds dashboard, review, artifacts, realtime collaboration, and CI orchestration

Product boundary

• YiACAD is not defined as a fork of KiCad or FreeCAD
• KiCad, KiBot, KiAuto, FreeCAD and related runtimes are integrated engines and worker lanes inside the YiACAD platform boundary
• the product shell, review model, collaboration model, and operator surfaces belong to YiACAD itself
• this spec follows the SOT fixed in specs/yiacad_2026_stack_target_spec.md and specs/yiacad_adr_20260329_sot.md

Core decisions

1. Platform core

• self-hosted Gitea or GitLab
• multi-tenant orgs and teams
• one project equals one repository

2. EDA engine

• queue-backed worker orchestration
• KiCad headless in containers
• KiBot for reproducible outputs
• KiAuto for ERC and DRC gates

3. Frontend

• Next.js + React for the first web client
• desktop shell remains a valid client lane for the same product boundary
• Excalidraw for system and wiring diagrams
• KiCanvas for PCB and schematic viewing
• KiCanvas stays review-only in the 2026 baseline
• Three.js and WASM are phase-2/phase-3 concerns, not MVP blockers

4. Realtime

• Yjs as CRDT layer
• dedicated websocket server
• persistence lane isolated from the HTTP GraphQL gateway

5. Data model

• Git keeps canonical EDA and diagram files
• Postgres or equivalent metadata/graph layer powers search, analytics, intelligent diffs, and SaaS controls

6. Parts/library system

• ElasticSearch or Typesense
• Redis cache
• imports from KiCad libs and external catalogs

7. Hardware CI/CD

• Git push triggers CI
• workers run KiBot, KiAuto, and KiCad CLI
• outputs include Gerber, BOM, STEP, PDF

8. Infra

• Kubernetes-backed workers
• S3 or Minio for artifacts
• Postgres for metadata
• Redis or Kafka for queueing
• OAuth or SSO at the edge

9. Multi-tenancy

• namespace isolation
• CI quotas
• usage-based controls

10. Business model

• free tier: public projects, limited CI
• paid tier: private repos, compute CI, advanced collaboration
• expansion: fabrication API, pricing, sourcing, component marketplace

11. Intelligence overlay

• review assist stays read-only until Git and CI read models are real
• MCP or service-first tools are the preferred boundary for parts search, CI triggers, artifact fetch, and ops summary
• Git remains the only product source of truth; Yjs remains collaboration transport; workers remain execution

Product pages

• Project dashboard
• Diagram editor
• PCB viewer
• PR review

Roadmap

Phase 1

• Git + KiBot CI
• web viewer
• artifact surfacing

Phase 2

• collaboration and comments
• parts DB
• PR previews

Phase 3

• browser-side editing
• simulation
• AI assist

Mermaid

flowchart TD
  Browser["Frontend app\nDashboard + Diagram + PCB + PR review"] --> Gateway["API gateway\nAuth + routing + GraphQL"]
  Gateway --> Project["Project service"]
  Gateway --> Realtime["Realtime service"]
  Gateway --> CI["CI orchestrator"]
  Gateway --> Parts["Parts DB service"]
  Realtime --> CRDT["Yjs / CRDT"]
  Realtime --> WS["WebSocket server"]
  CI --> Queue["Redis / Kafka queue"]
  Queue --> Workers["EDA workers on Kubernetes"]
  Workers --> KiCad["KiCad CLI"]
  Workers --> KiBot["KiBot"]
  Workers --> Exports["STEP + Gerber + PDF"]
  Project --> Git["Git source of truth"]
  Parts --> Search["Elastic / Typesense + cache"]
  CI --> Artifacts["S3 / Minio artifacts"]
  Gateway --> Meta["Postgres metadata + graph model"]

Current implementation delta

• web/ now hosts the first Next.js scaffold as the first YiACAD client.
• GraphQL currently exposes project state, diagrams, CI queue, artifacts, and PR review placeholders.
• Realtime transport is present as a dedicated Yjs websocket lane, but Excalidraw scene binding to CRDT is not done yet.
• KiCanvas support is vendored from the official bundle path into web/public/vendor/kicanvas.js.
• Queueing is now Redis-backed through BullMQ, with a dedicated worker entry at web/workers/eda-worker.mjs.
• The worker already routes into existing repo tools for kicad-headless, step-export, KiBot-compatible output generation, and KiAuto hooks.
• The remaining gaps are explicit: no real Git/PR read model yet, no live artifact serving surface, no Excalidraw-to-Yjs scene binding, and no read-only review assist/ops summary inside the product.
• The 2026 SOT keeps this lane review-first; browser-side authoring stays out of the baseline until a stronger CAD authoring surface is intentionally chosen and validated.