Replacing a symbol with another one might indeed be something that could benefit kicad. I suggest you look on the bugtracker if this is already requested if not then request it. (You can detail the workflow of exchanging one fully specified part with a similar other part. A possible help would be if the library browser would open with the same library active as the original symbol to reduce search time.)
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I do that all the time…?!
gives:
Hm, I just found that something odd is happening here with additional fields.
I guess my nightly has got a problem here and I have to test that with a stable version.
@Rene_Poschl
Is it normal that the extra fields I defined under Preferences in EEschema are not being created in the library Editor for symbols I create there from scratch?
And when I take a symbol from the schematic, edit it with the library editor, those fields are gone as well?
@Joan_Sparky
My 5.0.2 have only the “Save library as”. I can save a selected symbol as *.lib file.
What I wanted is, if say I have “Mylib:Mypart1” wanted to save it as “Mylib:Mypart2” and edit fields. Rene_Poschl’s suggestion to “Duplicate symbol” did the trick for me.
Yes, ‘Save As’ works the same from the tree.
But it doesn’t help you if you did the full specification in EESchema and now want to back-port that specced part in a/the library.
Right now one can only create and maintain fully specified part from within the symbol editor, with the caveat that the additional fields have to be created manually for each and every part that you create, not just the entries, but the full field description (= error prone).
IMHO the additional custom field dialog should apply to the symbol/library editor as well, at least as an option.
Heh, and here is the wishlist entry for that very problem: https://bugs.launchpad.net/kicad/+bug/1824471
Register and tick the ‘this affects me too’ option at the top of the bugreport if you think you want that too.
TL;DR:
fully specced part : library —> EEschema
fully specced part : EEschema -/-> library
Well I’ve found another side effect of the introduced “workaround”.
The problem is, symbol Value is considered a symbol Name in the library.
The workaround was to add the alternative “Value” field displayed in the schematic.
The side effect is, PCBNEW imports the Reference and… Value fields from the schematic.
For the ease of verification/assembly diagrams, it’s good to have a simple value (like 39k for the resistor) visible in the schematic (one Value displaying is enabled). At least, I use it in my workflow. With proposed workaround, I will see my inventory ID instead.
Do you have any working solution to that?
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