Author Topic: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad  (Read 20945 times)

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Offline piranha32Topic starter

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AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« on: August 07, 2015, 06:26:09 am »
Congrats to switching to KiCad :) Sometimes it can be a bit of a PITA, but I hope you will like it. I'm not talking about ideological reasons, pure economy.

Offline firewalker

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #1 on: August 07, 2015, 07:21:48 am »
Become a realist, stay a dreamer.

 

Offline EEVblog

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #2 on: August 07, 2015, 07:58:12 am »
Just DONT download the old version. See below for fresh Windows binaries.
http://www2.futureware.at/~nickoe/
http://www2.futureware.at/~nickoe/kicad-product-r6055.fa29c62-x86_64.exe

This is precisely what I've been talking about with Kicad that needs to end.
I have to go to a personal website to download the latest version :palm:
Wht can't they just have this on the damn website?  |O
 

Offline firewalker

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #3 on: August 07, 2015, 10:23:21 am »
The new version is on the way. They are fixing bugs (after code freezing) and they will release it.

Alexander.
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Offline FrankBuss

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #4 on: August 07, 2015, 11:19:25 am »
I tried KiCad some time ago. It is not bad. But sometimes it needs some time for the developers to fix things. I submitted a feature request, patch included how to implement it, and they didn't like it, despite the fact that other users want to have it, too. But hey, it's Open Source, we can always fork it :) PS: Looks like after 4 years finally it is implemented in the new page layout editor.
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Offline Wilksey

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #5 on: August 07, 2015, 11:41:55 am »
I would like to see a video of you reviewing the newer version over the previous version you did and give your overall opinion of the newer versions, it has come quite far since the one you originally test drove.
 

Offline c4757p

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #6 on: August 07, 2015, 11:46:37 am »
Just DONT download the old version. See below for fresh Windows binaries.
http://www2.futureware.at/~nickoe/
http://www2.futureware.at/~nickoe/kicad-product-r6055.fa29c62-x86_64.exe

This is precisely what I've been talking about with Kicad that needs to end.
I have to go to a personal website to download the latest version :palm:
Wht can't they just have this on the damn website?  |O

It is on the damn website, did you not read it? These are linked directly under Windows in Installing KiCad...
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Offline EEVblog

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #7 on: August 07, 2015, 01:31:19 pm »
It is on the damn website, did you not read it? These are linked directly under Windows in Installing KiCad...

It is not on the web/site. There is a link on the website that takes you to a personal web page that just has a directory of a million different things to download. It looks unprofessional and dodgy for a product that's trying to be taken seriously as a mainstream package :--
Imagine if Altium just provided a download link to Nick Martin's personal server directory that had dozens of different builds on it.
 

Offline c4757p

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #8 on: August 07, 2015, 01:53:26 pm »
Fair enough, though "not on the website" and "not hosted on the same server" are different complaints.

As usual, I'll just point out that we're in the process of 'recovery' - at the time of the previous release, KiCad was definitely a bit of a typical small FOSS project with people who didn't really care about having a nice website and good documentation and all that. I promise, all of this is changing, just perhaps not as fast as would be nice.

KiCad has a lot of blemishes, including its website, that are finally being taken care of. That will unfortunately require time. We're working on a new website, to debut simultaneously with the upcoming release. The download/hosting arrangement will change, at that point, to a much more professional style. The current candidate looks quite good in my opinion, though I'm not going to link it here because it's still being built and I don't want to give impressions based on its current unfinished status. Particularly here, where judging things when they're still not quite finished is the norm.

There are still some things to be fixed in the next release cycle. The upcoming release should be a significant improvement, and the one after that will be even further. Until then, the project is unfortunately held back a bit by its previous status as a relatively amateurish project. All I ask is that people be patient - keep in mind that we're currently hard at work trying to clean it up. If you don't want to use it until that cleanup effort is finished, that's fine. Just hold off on passing judgment on it until you see what comes out in the next release and in the release after that.

(And yes, I'm aware we've been saying that the release is right around the corner for a couple months now. I'm a bit annoyed by that too, but the decision is that we're not going to release while there are still outstanding major issues in a few specific places, and cleaning those up ended up being more work than was initially thought. I currently can't claim to know exactly when it will happen.)
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Offline mswhin63

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #9 on: August 07, 2015, 01:55:22 pm »

It is not on the web/site. There is a link on the website that takes you to a personal web page that just has a directory of a million different things to download. It looks unprofessional and dodgy for a product that's trying to be taken seriously as a mainstream package :--
Imagine if Altium just provided a download link to Nick Martin's personal server directory that had dozens of different builds on it.

Agreed, I too am looking into KiCAD and I find with such focus on the software Windows version is not well represented. Most software have programming updates and with a simple option to download development or stable updates it would save a hell of a lot of frustration in updating. Very backwards in this regards.

So far though it has a good interface but lack in some areas. Definitely private websites are so old school. Even a coding website like GITHUB for windows applications (if there is one) would be a better option.
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Offline firewalker

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #10 on: August 07, 2015, 02:13:26 pm »
@c4757p is the source for the windows binary packet available somewhere?

Alexander.
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Offline c4757p

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #11 on: August 07, 2015, 02:18:43 pm »
The source is this, including the NSIS scripts. I've not used it myself, but it looks fairly straightforward. I believe it is meant to be used from within MSYS2.
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Offline firewalker

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #12 on: August 07, 2015, 02:43:11 pm »
Thanks you.

Alexander.
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Offline Len

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #13 on: August 07, 2015, 04:03:57 pm »
As usual, I'll just point out that we're in the process of 'recovery' - at the time of the previous release, KiCad was definitely a bit of a typical small FOSS project with people who didn't really care about having a nice website and good documentation and all that. I promise, all of this is changing, just perhaps not as fast as would be nice.

That's good to hear. It has seemed like the KiCad maintainers were more interested in futzing around with their software than in producing something for others to use. With a bit of organization and focus on users, KiCad could become a top-tier option, like Firefox or WordPress.
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Offline firewalker

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #15 on: August 09, 2015, 05:18:03 am »
Lead developer:

http://ftp.belnet.be/FOSDEM/2015/devroom-electronic_design_automation/kicad.mp4

Alexander.

Well, I now know how to correctly pronounce KiCad.  I'ts pronounced "Kee"Cad.
 

Offline EEVblog

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #16 on: August 09, 2015, 08:30:41 am »
Well, I now know how to correctly pronounce KiCad.  I'ts pronounced "Kee"Cad.

Good to see I'm "correct" for a change  ;D
 

Offline tipofthesowrd

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #17 on: August 09, 2015, 10:03:30 am »
Wow, I just watched the video from FOSDEM and I wish I'd been there since I live in Belgium.
I'm a KiCad user myself and I really enjoyed watching Wayne explain his vision and share his experience as a developer over the years.

I'm really looking forward to continue using it!  :-+
 

Offline c4757p

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #18 on: August 09, 2015, 12:40:38 pm »
I don't have the link handy, but there is another FOSDEM video too, by Tomasz W?ostowski (one of the CERN developers) that goes into a good amount of technical detail about the new interactive routing engine. Developers among us may want to look for that too, it's pretty interesting.

Edit: stupid forum software, no Unicode in 2015?! Wlostowski.

Edit: here it is: Interactive PCB Routing: Ideas & algorithms we implemented in Kicad
« Last Edit: August 09, 2015, 01:01:02 pm by c4757p »
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Offline Miles Teg

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #19 on: August 10, 2015, 02:43:07 pm »
Sorry Dave, I'm a little late in the podcast listening, so I didn't heard yet the reason the DaveĀ² have switch from CircuitMaker to Kicad.
And I'm really interested as I'm currently business working succesfully with Altium (and interested to put personnal project and open HW with Circuit maker)
But I have another business opportunity, and they don't have the money for mutliples ALtium licences. And they seems to like working with Kicad.

For the moment I only tried the Kicad schematic side, and I'm little bit confused by the "footprint assignement" principle. I was so confy with Altium sch<->footprint DB with access DB.

I know we cannot compare fairly these 2 softwares. But I'm looking for what parts would give me more difficulties to switch between them. (still checking by myself :))

Thanks.
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Offline c4757p

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #20 on: August 10, 2015, 02:49:24 pm »
The footprint assignment is, in my opinion, at least a bit clunky in KiCad. Worse, the mechanism changed recently - for the better in my opinion, but there is always the side effect of invalidating old tutorials and the like.

I would think that the easiest way to assign footprints in KiCad for an Altium user, and indeed the way I do it, is to assign them individually from in the schematic. You can press F over any component to call up a footprint selector, and then that footprint is associated with that component. It'll stay that way if you copy the part, so you can set up one component and then duplicate it a bunch of times.

You can do this in your personal libraries as well, and those will be assigned to the part right out of the component selector. Many Altium libraries use a pre-assigned, one-footprint-per-symbol approach, which can be done in KiCad that way.
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Offline firewalker

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #21 on: August 10, 2015, 03:03:12 pm »
 I always liked the manual selection of modules (no footprint rubbish  :P  :P :P ) in a separate step.

Alexander.
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Offline c4757p

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #22 on: August 10, 2015, 03:05:17 pm »
modules (no footprint rubbish  :P  :P :P )

Hah. I'm glad they finally renamed "modules" to "footprints", what an awkward wording.
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Offline firewalker

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #23 on: August 10, 2015, 03:50:35 pm »
Is there any target date for the release?

Alexander.
Become a realist, stay a dreamer.

 

Offline timofonic

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Re: AmpHour #261: Daves switch to KiCad
« Reply #24 on: August 10, 2015, 04:29:09 pm »
Is there any target date for the release?

Alexander.

I think the reply will be:
When it's done(tm)

But they're finally near finishing the bugfixing phase and the bugtracker list is getting reduced, they said there's few to be done before a Release Candidate is done.

But better wait for a proper reply by a KiCad developer, I'm just a lurker!
« Last Edit: August 10, 2015, 04:42:31 pm by Circuiteromalaguito »
 


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