Addendum: Problem with GerbView/PCBnew import - Problem with translation

#12325

Hello.

The file "GerberMuell.zip" which should be at the attachent of my
previous post, too,  got lost somehow.

So i will add it here.

With best regards: Bernd Wiebus alias dl1eic

Problem with GerbView/PCBnew import - Problem with translation

#12324

Hello.

There is a problem with Gerbview. At the attachment are two files:
"ESD-Schutz.zip" and "GerberMuell.zip".
Both are containing some gerber files an a board file, produced by
GerbView/PCBnew from this Gerber files.

"ESD-Schutz.zip" was posted by a KiCad user in a German newsgroup, who
hat some problems tu export into PCBnew by  
GerbView. Especial he wonders about getting vias at PCBnew instead of
pads in gerbView. You can read this original discussion at:
 if you can understand
german.

I looked at his problem, tried with his files (which are produced by an
unknown other program), and experimented also with some Gerber files of
my own, which were created by KiCad istself.

Both sets of Gerber Files seems to be ok...i used Gerbv from the gEDA
Projekt, for getting an independent gerber viewer.

First about the files at ESD-Schutz.zip. I interpreted the files
KWS-ESD.GBL as backside
KWS-ESD.GKO as board edges
KWS-ESD.GTL as frontside (with smd pads)
KWS-ESD.GTP as paste stencil frontside

and imported them one by one starting with .GTP, .GTL, .GBL and at
last .GKO . (I renamed them also with the scheme "KWS-ESD-xxx.gbr and
imported them in this way, but this does not work better)
First: GerbView showed them correct. But sometimes i had to switch the
first imported layer off and on again to get it displayed.
When i export them to PCBnew, i have to sitch to two (copper) layers,
first, and than i have to rearrange the layer destination, despite i had
it importet by special suffixes like .GBL for backlyer.
However, the result is the same as i imported the files all together as
*.gbr files.

If i look now at the generated board with PCBnew, i have no pads, they
are all converted to vias (what i understand), but i lost the outline
and the paste stencil. But both would be helful. The outline, because
now i would have to draw the outline new, and the stencil as measurement
when i look for fitting footprints.

If i switch now back to GerbView, i can only see the first imported
layer. i cannot switch this layer of, and i cannot switch the other
layers on. I have to close and restart GerbView now, for dooing useful
things with him again.

If i accept the recommendet four copper layers at Gerber export, the
chaos will be ever bigger.
I suspected the German translation as wrong, because i noticed, that
GerbView suggested *.GBP as "L?tpaste oben" which means "Top paste" and
*GTP as "L?tpaste unten" which means "Bottom paste". Both is wrong......
So i switcht to English language. The results at PCBnew are different,
but not better.

I also droped *.GKO, because i suspected that creating a keep out area
instead of a board outline would be the culprit....but this had no
effect.
 
So i think, the problem partial has to do with layer naming and
counting, and i experimented with some old files i created by PCBnew
itsself. They are contained in "GerberMuell.zip" I imported this files
as bundle into GerbView (but without the drillfile). The result is, with
the exeption of getting vias instead of pads, much better.

But i have also to put the number of copper layers back to two and i
have to rearrange the fileuse to filename relation.

However, if i try to zoom or scroll at GerbView after the export to
PCBnew, the gerber files vanishes from the screen.....

I think, the problem of converting blinks to vias has no simple
solution. without the exeption of shape and position, the Gerberfiles do
not contain any information about the pads. Is it smd or is there a hole
in ec....?
So GerbView/PCBnew has to guess, and the easiest way is to say its a
via, because PCBnew either has to show it as copper  track (which would
not useful) or as a general via. But the original via values cannot
extracted from gerber, because they are context-dependent. You would
need information from other layers and the drillfile.
At this point, you would need much more artificial intelligence or you
will do it by hand, so i do not expect a solution.

But what is with the wrong translation and some other problems i
noticed?


With best regards: Bernd Wiebus alias dl1eic

Re: Multi-Part Components

#12323

The database I'm working on uses Firebird as the back end, which is FOS.  For the front end I'm using MS Access, but only because Libre/OpenOffice has a known show-stopper of a bug.   The front-end database has a few macros, queries and reports that allow it to produce a formatted parts list.   It also ensures that the parts list is frozen in a project database, so changes to the the data in the back-end don't get *silently* transferred to the parts list.

Creating the database has certainly proved to be a lot of work, so I have no plans to replace the front end with an application.   I could probably do it fairly quickly with MFC/DAO, but that would be Win only.  It really needs to be done by someone with serious cross-platform programming experience.   I have provided some code to show how to talk to the back-end database using ODBC.

Whilst the parts list generator would be independent of the existing kicad software, my thinking is that EESchema could be linked with the database engine via ODBC, eliminating the need for BOM export and providing a means of selecting components from the database into EESchema, but again I leave that to someone else.

Regards,

Robert.

Show quoted text

On 02/07/2012 19:14, Jeff Kaskey wrote:
FWIW, that's the way I do it. I am using Parts&Vendors (neither open
source nor free, and win-only, but reasonably inexpensive) and I dump
my KiCad BOM into it and output my purchase lists, kits, etc. Let
each tool do what it does best, do not expect KiCad to become an MRP
system.

Would love to see an open-source P&V-type database tool, but it is no
small amount of work. Besides the database design itself, the UI is
important in making the tool usable at all. You deal with a lot of
parts in a BOM, you need a UI that lets you do things quickly.

-j


________________________________ From:
Robert<birmingham_spider@...> To: kicad-users@...
Sent: Monday, July 2, 2012 10:04 AM Subject: Re: [kicad-users]
Multi-Part Components



IIRC there was a posting many months ago regarding a shareware
stock / parts system that provided quite a lot of functions and was
easy to use.

Maybe someone can remember the name.Funny you should mention that.   I've been working on my own
open-source database for kicad (files in the kicad user group, update
following soon), and that's what got me thinking about this.   I
think you have the answer though.   I just export the receptacle in
the BOM and the database adds the correct crimp terminal strip to the
parts list.

Thanks,

Robert.

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Re: Multi-Part Components

#12322

FWIW, that's the way I do it. I am using Parts&Vendors (neither open source nor free, and win-only, but reasonably inexpensive) and I dump my KiCad BOM into it and output my purchase lists, kits, etc. Let each tool do what it does best, do not expect KiCad to become an MRP system.

Would love to see an open-source P&V-type database tool, but it is no small amount of work. Besides the database design itself, the UI is important in making the tool usable at all. You deal with a lot of parts in a BOM, you need a UI that lets you do things quickly.

-j

Show quoted text

From: Robert
To: kicad-users@...
Sent: Monday, July 2, 2012 10:04 AM
Subject: Re: [kicad-users] Multi-Part Components

> IIRC there was a posting many months ago regarding a shareware stock /
> parts system that provided quite a lot of functions and was easy to use.
>
> Maybe someone can remember the name.

Funny you should mention that. I've been working on my own open-source
database for kicad (files in the kicad user group, update following
soon), and that's what got me thinking about this. I think you have
the answer though. I just export the receptacle in the BOM and the
database adds the correct crimp terminal strip to the parts list.

Thanks,

Robert.

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Re: Multi-Part Components

#12321

IIRC there was a posting many months ago regarding a shareware stock /
parts system that provided quite a lot of functions and was easy to use.

Maybe someone can remember the name.Funny you should mention that.   I've been working on my own open-source database for kicad (files in the kicad user group, update following soon), and that's what got me thinking about this.   I think you have the answer though.   I just export the receptacle in the BOM and the database adds the correct crimp terminal strip to the parts list.

Thanks,

Robert.

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Re: Multi-Part Components

Andy Eskelson

#12320

You give each part a unique ident, then you can export the BOM and feed
the result into an external stock control / parts database system. In
that you can associate the part with whatever source you are using. So if
you have 50 pins that come off a strip, your external system will add up
all the pins of that type, and total up the number of pin strips needed. 

It really is far too much hard work to try to get the Kicad BOM to do
things like this, it's simply the wrong tool.

IIRC there was a posting many months ago regarding a shareware stock /
parts system that provided quite a lot of functions and was easy to use.

Maybe someone can remember the name.


Andy




On Mon, 02 Jul 2012 17:41:11 +0100
Robert <birmingham_spider@...> wrote:

There was a recent discussion about putting things on the schematic so 
they get exported in the BOM but don't get placed on the PCB.   A 
related problem is multi-part components.   For example, a jack plug for 
a header might consist of a receptacle and a number of crimp terminals 
snapped off from a strip, the receptacle and the strip each having their 
own part number and ordering information.

Has anyone come up with a slick way to generate multiple parts in the 
BOM file for a single component on the schematic?

Regards,

Robert.

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Please read the Kicad FAQ in the group files section before posting your question.
Please post your bug reports here. They will be picked up by the creator of Kicad.
Please visit  for details of how to contribute your symbols/modules to the kicad library.
For building Kicad from source and other development questions visit the kicad-devel group at ! Groups Links

Multi-Part Components

#12319

There was a recent discussion about putting things on the schematic so they get exported in the BOM but don't get placed on the PCB.   A related problem is multi-part components.   For example, a jack plug for a header might consist of a receptacle and a number of crimp terminals snapped off from a strip, the receptacle and the strip each having their own part number and ordering information.

Has anyone come up with a slick way to generate multiple parts in the BOM file for a single component on the schematic?

Regards,

Robert.

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Re: Problem with kicad specctra export with round corners on board

dickelbeck

#12318

--- In kicad-users@..., Robert <birmingham_spider@...> wrote:

I could be wrong, but I am of the opinion currently that there is no
bug here.  The segments are pulled out of list, so the order is not
significant, because the list is sequentially searched as the
endpoints are matched up onto a second list of segments (the one
being built up during this verification phase).  This algorithm has
no conceptual problems.  I have also done a board using arcs on the
perimeter.  The key thing to remember is that the endpoints must
match up EXACTLY.  They cannot be off by even one internal unit.I realised the matching had to be accurate, which is possibly why things
went awry with arcs for me.   The board concerned had several arcs with
angles other than 90 degrees.   I just decided it was not worth having
the battle and selected the lesser hassle of drawing myself a temporary
board outline with straight lines.

Could the reason for the need for me to draw the lines in a specific
order be related to accuracy?   I have noticed some weirdness in kicad
when drawing copper tracks such that one ends up with segments that are
one or two kicad units long.   It's possible that the same mechanism has
resulted in PCB edge lines being disconnected by one or two kicad units
even though they were drawn snapping to grid.   This might be caused by
moving the entire board, or it might be caused by switching between 
"metric" grids that ought to be compatible (eg 0.2mm and 0.1mm) but
which in reality are not compatible due to kicad's use of US units
internally, or it might be something else.   Maybe you've had no
problems because being American you use US units (and then everything
just works).   I freely admit this is all supposition and background
thoughts whilst I'm working; I've not looked into this at all.

So I can believe you if you said there is no bug in the Spectra export;
the problem(s) may lie elsewhere and only show themselves during the export.

It's also possible that the code has been changed since I was struggling
with this.

Regards,

Robert.
What you say here seems plausible.  Someone would have to do a bug hunting expedition.

What I would suggest is to start Pcbnew from the command line, no board at all.  Create a PCB_EDGES perimeter on a blank sheet, save the board using the new *.kicad_pcb file format, which is extremely readable with a text editor.  This will be easiest to humanly read and find problems in visually, since it is self documenting.

Find your board edges in the *.kicad_pcb file, looking at each starting and ending point.  Go back to Pcbnew, make more changes, going through the UI gyrations that you would with your actual board.

It will be fairly easy to smoke out the point in time where problems occur.

Then persuade someone to fix the problem.

Things that will make this easier over the long haul are:

*) an error report into a text file for pcb edge problems during the specctra export.

*) when clicking on an edge segment, the status panel should show both endpoints' coordinates of the segment or arc.  I put that code in there once, am not sure its still there.

Re: Problem with kicad specctra export with round corners on board

#12317

I could be wrong, but I am of the opinion currently that there is no
bug here.  The segments are pulled out of list, so the order is not
significant, because the list is sequentially searched as the
endpoints are matched up onto a second list of segments (the one
being built up during this verification phase).  This algorithm has
no conceptual problems.  I have also done a board using arcs on the
perimeter.  The key thing to remember is that the endpoints must
match up EXACTLY.  They cannot be off by even one internal unit.I realised the matching had to be accurate, which is possibly why things went awry with arcs for me.   The board concerned had several arcs with angles other than 90 degrees.   I just decided it was not worth having the battle and selected the lesser hassle of drawing myself a temporary board outline with straight lines.

Could the reason for the need for me to draw the lines in a specific order be related to accuracy?   I have noticed some weirdness in kicad when drawing copper tracks such that one ends up with segments that are one or two kicad units long.   It's possible that the same mechanism has resulted in PCB edge lines being disconnected by one or two kicad units even though they were drawn snapping to grid.   This might be caused by moving the entire board, or it might be caused by switching between "metric" grids that ought to be compatible (eg 0.2mm and 0.1mm) but which in reality are not compatible due to kicad's use of US units internally, or it might be something else.   Maybe you've had no problems because being American you use US units (and then everything just works).   I freely admit this is all supposition and background thoughts whilst I'm working; I've not looked into this at all.

So I can believe you if you said there is no bug in the Spectra export; the problem(s) may lie elsewhere and only show themselves during the export.

It's also possible that the code has been changed since I was struggling with this.

Regards,

Robert.

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Re: Problem with kicad specctra export with round corners on board

dickelbeck

#12316

--- In kicad-users@..., Robert <birmingham_spider@...> wrote:

Yes, I've seen this, and it's a pain.   You might find it easiest to
simply draw the board edge as a rectangle for Freerouting, or as Aaron
suggests chamfer the corners.   However, what I found was that it was
important how I drew the board edge.   I had to draw each element in
turn in the correct order.   If the board has four corners A, B, C, and
D, I had to draw A to B, B to C, C to D, D to A.   Anything else
resulted in the error message you have reported.   Arcs proved to be
impossible to use.

I suspect the bug is caused by kicad looking at the start and end of
each *line* and *as defined in the .brd file*, and checking they match.
   If you understand why that approach is flawed, you'll understand how
to workaround the problem.

Regards,

Robert.
I could be wrong, but I am of the opinion currently that there is no bug here.  The segments are pulled out of list, so the order is not significant, because the list is sequentially searched as the endpoints are matched up onto a second list of segments (the one being built up during this verification phase).  This algorithm has no conceptual problems.  I have also done a board using arcs on the perimeter.  The key thing to remember is that the endpoints must match up EXACTLY.  They cannot be off by even one internal unit.

What is needed is an error report file, so that you get an extract of the PCB_EDGES and a detailed reporting of the problem.  The UI does not do an adequate job of reporting the error, with sufficient detail to actually allow you to fix the problem edge(s).  Please also be aware that even if you have accurate end to end edges creating a completely closed polygon, any EXTRA segments will also cause this error.  This could be a segment of very short length, situated on top of another edge so that you cannot see it clearly.

Re: FreeRoute Error Message - Multiple components have identical reference IDs of "1

#12315

I figured this out.  I had four holes for mounting with the same name.  I've changed the names to unique names and numbers and can now export a DSN file.  However after I run autorouter and export a ses file and then try to import it into PCBNew I get an error:

IO_ERROR: Session file has 'reference' to non-existent component "Hole1"
 from /builddir/build/BUILD/kicad-2012.01.19/pcbnew/specctra.cpp : ThrowIOError() : line 119
BOARD may be corrupted, do not save it.
Fix problem and try again.

I can see this is still related to my hole modules.  I see it says component. Do I have to create a component in eeschema for the holes even if they are not connected to anything?

Show quoted text

--- In kicad-users@..., "tmortus" <tom_mort@...> wrote:

I'm routing my first circuit and thought I would use FreeRoute.

When I tried to export my design to a DSN file I got the following error:

IO_ERROR: Multiple components have identical reference IDs of "1PIN".
 from /builddir/build/BUILD/kicad-2012.01.19/pcbnew/specctra.cpp : ThrowIOError() : line 119
Unable to export, please fix and try again.

I've run the schematic and the PCB new design checkers and there were no problems listed.

I'm not sure what this message is telling me.  I have a number of components and corresponding modules with a pin number one,  but, each component and module has a different name.

???

FreeRoute Error Message - Multiple components have identical reference IDs of "1

#12314

I'm routing my first circuit and thought I would use FreeRoute.

When I tried to export my design to a DSN file I got the following error:

IO_ERROR: Multiple components have identical reference IDs of "1PIN".
 from /builddir/build/BUILD/kicad-2012.01.19/pcbnew/specctra.cpp : ThrowIOError() : line 119
Unable to export, please fix and try again.

I've run the schematic and the PCB new design checkers and there were no problems listed.

I'm not sure what this message is telling me.  I have a number of components and corresponding modules with a pin number one,  but, each component and module has a different name.

???

Re: Dummy/Placeholder Footprint

#12313

I did - for the header.   But I wanted the buzzer in the parts list too.

Show quoted text

On 30/06/2012 18:35, JorgeF_Tech wrote:
Hi

I would say that you should have used the header component and footprint.

Just my 2 cents

Best regards

Jorge

De: kicad-users@... [mailto:kicad-users@...] Em nome
de Robert
Enviada: sbado, 30 de Junho de 2012 17:54
Para: kicad-users@...
Assunto: Re: [kicad-users] Dummy/Placeholder Footprint

By a strange co-incidence I wanted to do the same just a few days ago
for a wired piezo-beeper that is mounted off-board but connected via an
on-board header. I don't know if it's the best solution but I simply
didn't give the component a footprint. PCBNew grumbles when the
netlist is imported, but otherwise all was OK.

Regards,

Robert.

On 30/06/2012 08:00, KB1LQC wrote:
Hi All,

Just wondering if there is a module or if I could create my own that has adummy part in it. This would allow me to place a symbol in eeschema that
represents a component not on the board like bolts, nuts, other mounting
hardware, etc. but would not actually result in a footprint on the PCB? This
makes creating the BOM much easier for a project. Is this possible? I
performed several quick searches of the messages here but turned up nothing.

Bryce

------------------------------------

Please read the Kicad FAQ in the group files section before posting yourquestion.
Please post your bug reports here. They will be picked up by the creatorof Kicad.
Please visit  for details of how to contribute yoursymbols/modules to the kicad library.
For building Kicad from source and other development questions visit thekicad-devel group at ! Groups
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Re: Dummy/Placeholder Footprint

JorgeF_Tech

#12312

开云体育

Hi

?

I would say that you should have used the “header…” component and footprint.

?

Just my 2 cents…

?

Best regards

Jorge

?

De: kicad-users@... [mailto:kicad-users@...] Em nome de Robert
Enviada: sábado, 30 de Junho de 2012 17:54
Para: kicad-users@...
Assunto: Re: [kicad-users] Dummy/Placeholder Footprint

?

By a strange co-incidence I wanted to do the same just a few days ago
for a wired piezo-beeper that is mounted off-board but connected via an
on-board header. I don't know if it's the best solution but I simply
didn't give the component a footprint. PCBNew grumbles when the
netlist is imported, but otherwise all was OK.

Regards,

Robert.

Show quoted text

On 30/06/2012 08:00, KB1LQC wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> Just wondering if there is a module or if I could create my own that has a dummy part in it. This would allow me to place a symbol in eeschema that represents a component not on the board like bolts, nuts, other mounting hardware, etc. but would not actually result in a footprint on the PCB? This makes creating the BOM much easier for a project. Is this possible? I performed several quick searches of the messages here but turned up nothing.
>
>
> Bryce
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Please read the Kicad FAQ in the group files section before posting your question.
> Please post your bug reports here. They will be picked up by the creator of Kicad.
> Please visit for details of how to contribute your symbols/modules to the kicad library.
> For building Kicad from source and other development questions visit the kicad-devel group at ! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>
> ---
> avast! Antivirus: Inbound message clean.
> Virus Database (VPS): 120630-0, 30/06/2012
> Tested on: 30/06/2012 17:39:34
> avast! - copyright (c) 1988-2012 AVAST Software.
>
>
>
>
>

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Re: Dummy/Placeholder Footprint

#12311

Hello Bryce.

Just wondering if there is a module or if I could create my own that has a dummy part in it. This would allow me to place a symbol in eeschema that represents a component not on the board like bolts, nuts, other mounting hardware, etc. but would not actually result in a footprint on the PCB? This makes creating the BOM much easier for a project. Is this possible? I performed several quick searches of the messages here but turned up nothing.
Of course yes, this is possible.

Just make a footprint with nothing in and save it with a name.

With best regards: Bernd Wiebus alias dl1eic

Re: Dummy/Placeholder Footprint

#12309

By a strange co-incidence I wanted to do the same just a few days ago for a wired piezo-beeper that is mounted off-board but connected via an on-board header.   I don't know if it's the best solution but I simply didn't give the component a footprint.   PCBNew grumbles when the netlist is imported, but otherwise all was OK.

Regards,

Robert.

Show quoted text

On 30/06/2012 08:00, KB1LQC wrote:
Hi All,

Just wondering if there is a module or if I could create my own that has a dummy part in it. This would allow me to place a symbol in eeschema that represents a component not on the board like bolts, nuts, other mounting hardware, etc. but would not actually result in a footprint on the PCB? This makes creating the BOM much easier for a project. Is this possible? I performed several quick searches of the messages here but turned up nothing.

Bryce

------------------------------------

Please read the Kicad FAQ in the group files section before posting your question.
Please post your bug reports here. They will be picked up by the creator of Kicad.
Please visit  for details of how to contribute your symbols/modules to the kicad library.
For building Kicad from source and other development questions visit the kicad-devel group at ! Groups Links

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(No subject)

Aurel Cristescu

#12307

Dummy/Placeholder Footprint

KB1LQC

#12308

Hi All,

Just wondering if there is a module or if I could create my own that has a dummy part in it. This would allow me to place a symbol in eeschema that represents a component not on the board like bolts, nuts, other mounting hardware, etc. but would not actually result in a footprint on the PCB? This makes creating the BOM much easier for a project. Is this possible? I performed several quick searches of the messages here but turned up nothing.

Bryce

csv2kicad_energymicro - a python script to generate multi-unit (MCU) components

#12306

Hello KiCad users,

You might like to know about a python script I just finished which takes CSV data from one or many files and generates a LIB and DCM file.

It was specifically written to generate four unit MCU schematic components from the CSV data available from Energy Micro for their range of ARM Cortex MCUs. However, there's no reason it shouldn't be adapted to generated other components requiring a similar style.

The script, and 144 component library files are available here:
https://github.com/hairykiwi/csv2kicad
(I know about the KiCad alias field, it's just not yet implemented, so apologies for the lib file size.)
It's licensed CC-BY-SA 3.0.

For the record: csv2kicad_energymicro.py is supplied (quiet thoroughly checked but) without warranty. Energy Micro have not endorsed my work and I have no financial motivations for mentioning Energy Micro, besides my intention to use them in a (potentially commercial) openhardware project.

Any feedback is much appreciated.

Best regards,
Hamish Mead
< hairykiwi >
Ledbury, UK

Re: status of Protel to KiCAD conversion tools

Miguel Angel Ajo Pelayo

#12305

I think altium can read protel and export to pcad format :-)

2012/6/28 Alexander Lunev <al.lunev@...>

Show quoted text

?

Hi Andrew,

The Protel ASCII format is not compatible with the P-Cad 200x ASCII format.
Thus pcad2kicad can not be directly used for translation from Protel to KiCad. May be there is some indirect approach.

Protel ASCII format:?

P-Cad 2006 ASCII format:?

Best regards,

Alexander Lunev?

From: lynchaj <lynchaj@...>
To: kicad-users@...
Sent: Wednesday, June 27, 2012 3:14 PM
Subject: [kicad-users] status of Protel to KiCAD conversion tools

?

Hi

Has anyone tried the Protel to KiCAD conversion tools recently? How well do they working importing a schematic and/or PCB layout?

There is a sourceforge page which I think is related

I am asking because there is a legacy PCB project trapped in the Protel format and I am wondering what options are available to convert to a free/open solution or if it is lost to proprietary obscurity.

Thanks!

Andrew Lynch

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Miguel Angel Ajo Pelayo

+34 636 52 25 69
skype: ajoajoajo