Re:Etch a circuit board with kitchen supplies
by dbcurtis on Sunday November 11, 2018 @10:30PM
(#18430392)
I use KiCAD when I am forced to. Of the two open source EDA packages that I am aware of, KiCAD certainly has an easier learning curve than gEDA. That said, I started with gEDA so I have surmounted the learning and libraries problems sufficiently for my needs. My beef with KiCAD is that it is weak sauce, I find it missing a number of the features that I take for granted with gEDA. I don’t use KiCAD for personal projects, the limitations frustrate me. OTOH Somebody just starting out and doing simple boards would probably find KiCAD more approachable than gEDA.
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Re:Etch a circuit board with kitchen supplies
by ohazi on Monday November 12, 2018 @12:07AM
(#18430718)
I too dragged myself up the seemingly insurmountable learning curve that was gEDA about a decade ago and used it exclusively for many years. I poked around in KiCad every now and then and didn't think much of it either.
Since the changes that CERN made, KiCad is a completely new tool. It is now my tool of choice, and unless gEDA gets a similarly drastic revamp, I'm probably never going back.
Re:Etch a circuit board with kitchen supplies
by bacon_waffle on Monday November 12, 2018 @01:29AM
(#18430946)
Out of interest, what KiCad limitations frustrate you? My main frustration is with pcbnew's (the layout program) apparent inability to store sets of design rules, so they need to be set for each run.
I've not got any skin in the game as such, but occasionally think about contributing to it - usually after getting irritated by random UI things, but so far it's never quite been enough to dive in and fix anything.