Hi All, I am pretty new to this forum and maybe my question is because of that in the wrong category. I have a personal user library containing some devices with directories: symbols, footprints, 3dmodels, resources and a file: metadata.json . The library works normal and is installing normally using the Manage symbol/footprint libraries. But now I want to do it under PCM control. I zipped the library to use the: Install from file entry in the PCM window…I minimized the metadata.json file in that way I have only the required stuff according to the document: kicad-addons. I attached my metadat.json file. I copied the zip file to the KiCad scripting directory. When I try to install in PCM I get the Error: Archive does not contain a valid metadata.json file. How can I get this working ? I have no idea what is going wrong.
Very good idea. Never thought about adding custom libraries that way.
In your JSON file try adding below line before your exisiting 2nd line “name”:… "$schema": "https://go.kicad.org/pcm/schemas/v1",
and check if that helps.
Your metadata file needs to be inside the zip archive. There are also strict requirements on how files and directories inside that zip file need to be laid out for installation to work.
Hi, I checked the zipfile. The metadata.json file is as I expected still included in the compressed file. I also added the topline “$schema…” in the metadata file. The result is still the same that it remains complaining about the metadata file. So until now no progress to report. I also donot know how to debug the .json file to find out where it is going wrong. So please I am open for any idea, solutions you have etc. in finding what is going on?
Regards, Frank
Make sure metadata.json is directly in the root of the archive, not in any folder.
Verify that it complies with the schema, you can use tool like this https://www.jsonschemavalidator.net/
Put the schema from this on the left and your json on the right.
It is working! The reason why it was complaining about the metadata.json file wasn’t that there was an error in the file. I checked the file with the validator and that was okay. The issue was that PCM couldn’t find the file at all due to a simple issue: I have a directory fmsoft-kicad-library and in it are the Symbol, Footprints etc. dir’s and files. The zip file has to be created on the dir’s and files level and NOT what I did on the fmsoft-kicad-library level. So above point-1 was the issue!
When you use: Install from file it directly installs everything. Is there a way also when I have multiple user-libraries to get first an overview of the user packages and then you can select which you want to install? Just like the official repository but then local with all my user-libraries? Thanks for your help!
Regards, Frank
Looking to the number of hits about this subject I made the conclusion that many people are interested in this subject. Therefore I uploaded my brief userguide how to make a user-library install under control of the PCM in KiCad. I hope this helps other people in figure out how to do. I have to thank mr “quick” for helping me at a crucial moment in make it work. KiCad_Install_Lib_under_PCM.pdf (544.2 KB)
Hi, I made a couple of changes including the location of my user-repository. Is it in this way a better description and somewhat more accurate? Thanks KiCad_Install_Lib_under_PCM.pdf (642.5 KB)