There have some discussions related to ‘local’ copies of datasheets. imho linking to datasheets on the web is not a good idea. Often links get broken. This does not only apply to Kicad, but I often encounter the same situation on distributors’ websites as well.
Currently I am using ${DATASHEETS_DIR}, which expands to a local path. However there seems no way to browse the path when adding a datasheet to a symbol (or am I overlooking something ?) .
Currently I am doing some copy-paste and manual edit to get a datasheet link in the symbol, which is not ideal. Adding a browse dialog seems trivial, so I wonder if there is something I do not know or if there are better ways to manage ‘local’ datasheets ?
It is possible to define say KICAD_USER_DATASHEET_DIR to be a local file prefix in the form: file:///home/user/kicad_datasheets (note that file:// is the scheme, replacing the usual https:// and the third / is the root of the Linux filesystem, in Windows it would be something like file://c:/…)
As far as I know the browse dialog doesn’t know about variable expansions.
Maybe you should put in a feature request on Gitlab if there isn’t one already.
Currently there is no better direct solution to add the datasheet links
My view on this general datasheet topic: I wait until the eeschema-extension API arrives and than hope to get a extension like described below.
All solutions with fixed datasheet-links show the same disadvantages (like broken links), so for exactly this need (local stored datasheets) I developed a extension for my previous used CAD-tool. This eagle ULP worked sufficient enough (for me), so I’m personally waiting for the arrival of eeschema-python API to develop a similar extension for kicad.
characteristics:
definable search path
take the symbol-name (value) -->derives the first letter-digit combination → search all files which contain this string
present selection-dialog with these files
doubleclick opens file in pdf-reader
disadvantages:
This solution needs 1 more click than the standard “define one datasheet in symbol and open exactly these file on datasheet-hotkey” → not so convenient
it’ not 100% reliable: there are cases where no result or where an overwhelming amount of results are found
you get no advantage of automatically updated datasheets on manufacturer website
it’s really a choice of preference - hence I have not tried to enforce this into standard kicad functionality
on the other side the advantages:
I think it’s a really good solution for an addon
it worked well enough for the last 10years of eagle usage
it worked well enough with rougly 5GB / 5000 files of datasheets (i would say reliability ~98%-99%)
local datasheet is really useful for mobile work
works well with multiple added files per symbol
and not to mention the slow internet connection which makes downloading large datasheets very unpleasant on
For all who still use eagle and want to try the addon: IBFEEW - KnowHow (sorry, german only)