7.0 Plugin and Content manager not starting

marien-MV-Ware · March 18, 2023, 10:39pm

Hi,
I don’t use any Proxy.
deleting C:\User… \pcm: did not help
I tried the python row from previous message, I shows the print screens of that. I got no reaction on this.
I turned of all my protections, antivirus, firewalls, etc… dit not help.
I also installed 7.0 on a complete other computer, W10, whit other configs… Did not work aswell
Opening Plugin manager gives this dialog for hours…

When i close this not responding dialog, Kicad closes completely, losing my not saved work…

qu1ck · March 19, 2023, 3:34am

And what about this?

marien-MV-Ware · March 19, 2023, 10:50am

As I showed in previous message. I only get that dialog window, which give a no responding message.
After all actions I did on all advices.
So as a result I don’t get to the plug in manager at all. in no case. I only know the plugin manager from the manuals, how it should look like…
On my question, how I can install plugins without this manager, and how I can do that, I did not get an answere
It would also help if there is a log-file? a message? a fault-error code? now it seems impossibel to trace where the systems stops its program. Aren’t there exception handlers?

qu1ck · March 19, 2023, 1:46pm

I guess I didn’t make my question clear. Here is what I asked you to try in more details:

Delete everything in C:\Users\<your username>\AppData\Local\kicad\7.0\pcm
Launch kicad and try to open plugin manager.
Check what shows up in C:\Users\<your username>\AppData\Local\kicad\7.0\pcm

On a properly working kicad installation plugin manager will download cache of the official repository which will look like a folder with name 46f88614eade3439 and 3 files within it: repository.json, packages.json and resources.zip. Plugin manager downloads them in that specific order.

I’m asking about this because based on what shows up there we will be able to determine some things:

If nothing shows up there then we will know that plugin manager can not download anything at all. But I don’t think that’s the case because one of your posts above shows contents of repository.json.
If only one of json files shows up that would be strange. I don’t think it’s likely and don’t know what can cause this.
If both files show up but not the zip file then it is likely antivirus software interfering with kicad.
If they all show up and have contents (i.e. are not 0 byte files) then the issue is not with downloading files and somewhere else.

There is one more thing you can try to determine if issue is with network or not (but make sure to try the above first, it will give us more information):
Go to C:\Users\<your username>\AppData\Roaming\kicad\7.0 (note the difference in path, this is Roaming, not Local) and open kicad.json in a text editor. You will find a section named pcm in there which should look something like this:

  "pcm": {
    "check_for_updates": true,
    "last_download_dir": "D:\\Downloads",
    "lib_auto_add": true,
    "lib_auto_remove": true,
    "lib_prefix": "PCM_",
    "repositories": [
      {
        "name": "KiCad official repository",
        "url": "https://repository.kicad.org/repository.json"
      }
    ]
  },

Try removing following lines:

      {
        "name": "KiCad official repository",
        "url": "https://repository.kicad.org/repository.json"
      }

So that repositories is just an empty array. That way when you launch kicad manager it will not attempt to download anything at all. If you are able to open the plugin manager window with that this will be another confirmation that issue is likely with network or antivirus preventing you from downloading some things.

You can browse and download plugins without opening plugin manager by going to PCM repository browser | KiCad EDA

Some plugins have a separate downloadable archive for manual installation, check their github/gitlab links in description and follow their installation instructions.

If they don’t have separate archive you can still use archive intended for installation through plugin manager.

If you are able to open the plugin manager window after removing official repository from configuration like I explained above, you will be able to use Install from file... feature to point plugin manager to your downloaded plugin archive and it will do the rest.
If you still can’t open plugin manager then you will have to go full manual route. Open pcb editor, go to Tools -> External Plugins -> Open Plugin Directory. That will open a folder where manually installed plugins should go, it should be C:\Users\<your username>\Documents\KiCad\7.0\scripting\plugins. Extract the plugins subdirectory from the plugin archive you downloaded there and only that subdirectory. So you will end up with following folder: C:\Users\<your username>\Documents\KiCad\7.0\scripting\plugins\plugins. To be able to install multiple plugins that way you should rename plugins after you extract it to something else but make sure to not use spaces, dots or other special characters in the name. So in the end you will end up with C:\Users\<your username>\Documents\KiCad\7.0\scripting\plugins\<someplugin>.

To answer other questions:

There is no log file because your problem is very unusual one. Plugin manager has existed in kicad for more than a year and aside from few reports of issues with antivirus and proxies it works for everyone. So there is generally no need to debug so no unnecessary log files. Of course there are exception handlers but they don’t work when program execution is interfered with by external causes like antivirus.

Of course there still can be a bug and a situation that is not properly handled which is why I’m helping you. As a Kicad contributor who developed most of plugin manager I’m invested in fixing it if there is one.

One last thing: please post full kicad version information by going to Help -> About kicad, pressing Copy version info and then pasting the text here.

marien-MV-Ware · March 19, 2023, 4:49pm

thanks for huge answere, very fine…

1e:
Delete everything in C:\Users<your username>\AppData\Local\kicad\7.0\pcm
Answere= Done
Launch kicad and try to open plugin manager.
Answere= done. It shows the previous hanging dialog, wait hours… Not reponding, so I exit/canceled the Kicad programm.
Check what shows up in C:\Users<your username>\AppData\Local\kicad\7.0\pcm
Answere= Empty (even with all virus protections off)

On a properly working kicad installation plugin manager will download cache of the official repository which will
look like a folder with name 46f88614eade3439 and 3 files within it: repository.json, packages.json and resources.zip.
Plugin manager downloads them in that specific order.
Answere= this (46f88614eade3439) folder I deleted it in step above.

Removing following lines:
{
“name”: “KiCad official repository”,
“url”: “https://repository.kicad.org/repository.json”
}
Answere= Yes, the manager opens.
(Still all my virus protection is off.)

Now I proceed the rest of your answere about manual plugin install

marien-MV-Ware · March 19, 2023, 5:05pm

Installed Kicad version:

Application: KiCad x64 on x64

Version: (7.0.0), release build

Libraries:
wxWidgets 3.2.1
FreeType 2.12.1
HarfBuzz 5.0.1
FontConfig 2.14.1
libcurl/7.83.1-DEV Schannel zlib/1.2.13

Platform: Windows 10 (build 19045), 64-bit edition, 64 bit, Little endian, wxMSW

Build Info:
Date: Feb 12 2023 01:35:19
wxWidgets: 3.2.1 (wchar_t,wx containers)
Boost: 1.80.0
OCC: 7.6.2
Curl: 7.83.1-DEV
ngspice: 39
Compiler: Visual C++ 1934 without C++ ABI

Build settings:
KICAD_SPICE=ON

marien-MV-Ware · March 19, 2023, 5:10pm

When I enter : https://repository.kicad.org/repository.json
in the chrome adress bar, I get a script file dump.
I’m not able to understand what this is, or what it means, or what it helps…
For your Idea, Im running W10 on a HP Z4, with Norton 360 delux.
java version 8 Update 321.
In an other folder Python 3.10 is installed.

{
“$schema”: “https://gitlab.com/kicad/code/kicad/-/raw/master/kicad/pcm/schemas/pcm.v1.schema.json#/definitions/Repository”,
“maintainer”: {
“contact”: {
“web”: “Contact Us | KiCad EDA”
},
“name”: “KiCad team”
},
“name”: “KiCad official repository”,
“packages”: {
“sha256”: “881868878dbf3fa0e56f7427da1a342f85ae0f5ad4461c88356a3f9a9edfd53a”,
“update_time_utc”: “2023-03-17 14:26:56”,
“update_timestamp”: 1679063216,
“url”: “https://gitlab.com/kicad/addons/repository/-/raw/main/packages.json”
},
“resources”: {
“sha256”: “f52d096488495b2e6d88be1b1d015758044894b31713898a7d22f966ff59e791”,
“update_time_utc”: “2023-03-17 14:26:56”,
“update_timestamp”: 1679063216,
“url”: “https://gitlab.com/kicad/addons/repository/-/jobs/artifacts/main/raw/artifacts/resources.zip?job=update”
}
}

marien-MV-Ware · March 19, 2023, 5:18pm

My Visual Studio:

Microsoft Visual Studio Professional 2015
Version 14.0.25431.01 Update 3
Microsoft .NET Framework
Version 4.8.04084

Installed Version: Professional

LightSwitch for Visual Studio 2015 00322-40000-00000-AA865
Microsoft LightSwitch for Visual Studio 2015

Visual Basic 2015 00322-40000-00000-AA865
Microsoft Visual Basic 2015

Visual C# 2015 00322-40000-00000-AA865
Microsoft Visual C# 2015

Visual C++ 2015 00322-40000-00000-AA865
Microsoft Visual C++ 2015

Application Insights Tools for Visual Studio Package 7.0.20622.1
Application Insights Tools for Visual Studio

ASP.NET and Web Tools 2015.1 (Beta8) 14.1.11107.0
ASP.NET and Web Tools 2015.1 (Beta8)

ASP.NET Web Frameworks and Tools 2012.2 4.1.41102.0
For additional information, visit http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=309563

ASP.NET Web Frameworks and Tools 2013 5.2.40314.0
For additional information, visit http://www.asp.net/

Common Azure Tools 1.8
Provides common services for use by Azure Mobile Services and Microsoft Azure Tools.

JavaScript Language Service 2.0
JavaScript Language Service

JavaScript Project System 2.0
JavaScript Project System

Microsoft Azure Mobile Services Tools 1.4
Microsoft Azure Mobile Services Tools

NuGet Package Manager 3.4.4
NuGet Package Manager in Visual Studio. For more information about NuGet, visit http://docs.nuget.org/.

PreEmptive Analytics Visualizer 1.2
Microsoft Visual Studio extension to visualize aggregated summaries from the PreEmptive Analytics product.

SQL Server Data Tools 14.0.60519.0
Microsoft SQL Server Data Tools

TypeScript 1.8.36.0
TypeScript tools for Visual Studio

marien-MV-Ware · March 19, 2023, 5:34pm

this adress:
https://gitlab.com/kicad/addons/repository/-/jobs/artifacts/main/raw/artifacts/resources.zip?job=update

saves a resourses.zip to my system. about 191kbyte

marien-MV-Ware · March 19, 2023, 5:49pm

On the laptop, a Lenovo, from my work, the manager did also not work.
I can check this again… because i uninstalled Kicad, after the test…

qu1ck · March 19, 2023, 6:36pm

So it did download it at some point but now it will not create it anymore? That’s even weirder.

Try version 7.0.1, it has a fix for kicad not handling corrupted data for plugin manager correctly. That normally resulted in a crash, not hanging program, but maybe it’s something related. You can also try deleting installed_packages.json in Roaming\kicad\7.0 because that one was causing crash if it was malformed.

That is expected.

marien-MV-Ware · March 19, 2023, 7:15pm

Hi,
the first yes Weird. Ther were 3 files, the two Json and a zero-byte resources.zip.
2e yes good plan 7.0.1. I’ll do that tomorrow.
many thx so far…