[Answered] Github repo as library

Hello everyone!

KiCad 4.0.7 has a “feature” of adding libraries directly from github when using “Add Library with Wizard”, but if I’m trying to use KiCad part repos from some manufacturers (like SparkFun repo here : https://github.com/sparkfun/SparkFun-KiCad-Libraries) it doesn’t see any.

So questions are:

  1. what should be structure of repo, to make it recognizable by KiCad?
  2. I don see “Add library with Wizard” in KiCad 5 builds. Is this feature planned to be deprecated?

Thanks!

Using on demand github download is no longer the suggested way to add libraries. I would suggest you download (or clone) the repo locally and add the local repos using the library manager (or wizard)

Drawbacks of on demand libs:

  • no control over the used version. (Always git master)
  • every library must be in its own repo (hard to maintain, makes releasing specific versions a lot harder)
  • a lot of unnecessary internet traffic. (The plugin downloads full libs as zip. The local cache is deleted every time kicad is closed.)
  • it relies on the github API. There is no guarantee that it stays unchanged for the coming years. (It is not meant for such a use case. )
3 Likes

Thanks, good to know!

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