The standard logic libraries in KiCAD for 74xx and 4xxx symbols have parallel versions for the IEC- type symbols, 74xx_IEEE and 4xxx_IEEE.
Do designers here actually use these symbols, especially for counters, muxes, decoders, bus functions etc.?
Or would like to use them if the libraries were better?
This is not an idle question, I’m looking for input for a class.
Thanks.
I learned about them in school some 30 years ago, and they do make schematics a bit clearer in some ways. But they also have disadvantages. splitting the symbols in a “common” section and an “input/output” section makes the symbols often quite a lot bigger, and that makes them more difficult to fit on a schematic. You need more zooming on a big sheet, or you need more sheets. And nearly always you still have to check a lot of details with the datasheets, and having a symbol that is “a bit clearer” does not matter much once you read the datasheet. So overall, I prefer the old fashioned variant and do not use the IEEE variants myself.
I have never used them, even when TTL logic was the standard practice. The British Post Office, BBC and military never required them.
I have heard of other environments that did.
I think that the only reason for their use now is reverse engineering some museum design into KiCad. There are people who do this as a hobby!
Never used them.
Used a couple that weren’t in the normal library for a retro project, 7450 and 7490 IIRC, but didn’t like them because they are too large. I’d probably make my yellow box symbols if I were doing it today.
Thanks for all your responses, all very helpful.
I’ll leave the IEEE stuff out of my small internal course.
Comment:
Looking at the IEEE libraries in KiCAD, they were bad in 5.1, worse in 6.0 and the pits in 7.0, where a simple counter is very big.
Example: 74LS161
non-IEEE: 1.1" x 0.6"
IEEE: 2.0" x 1.0" - Twice the size in dimensions, quadruple in area. Totally unnecessary and unattractive. And even the TC output is represented wrong, otherwise the symbol would be even bigger.
Just for fun, I tried making my own IEEE symbol for that part:
I don’t want to dampen anyone’s enthusiasm for the IEEE symbols if they like them, but I have always found them confusing – and, as you point out @ml9104, graphically unattractive compared to the good-ol mil-std symbols and their de-morgan equivalents. Back in the 80s I avoided TI’s logic databooks since they used those confusing symbols, and filled my shelves instead with blue books from national. I haven’t seen or used metal-gate 4000 cmos (which was actually a pleasant and flexible family to use) or even LS ttl in over three decades, though I have occasion to add a 1G or 2G lvc here and there these days 
I actually said that the KiCAD library implementation of the symbols is unattractive.
Not the symbols themself. I quite like them for their structure and additional information as per my posted example.
Well, fair enough. I just always found them confusing, and I guess I like the old-school look.
Who nowadays uses digital logic ICs others than simple gates?
My last construction based on digital logic ICs was my frequency counter I build in 1985. To limit power use (TTL needed lot of current) instead of using 8 4-bit latches + 4 8-input muxes I used 4 8-bit paralel input serial output shift registers.
As you think of a class I think it is important to learn a functions offered by digital ICs (just to understand logic and know about history) but symbols used are not important as no one will seriously use them.
Maybe people trying to restore old designs and equipment? In particular from layouts only. Anyway, just don’t look at them, or delete them if they don’t matter to you.
I’m going to, one of these days. I have very many 4000 series CMOS ICs I want to find a use for.
I just have to dream up a suitable project. 
I have no problem with it. I don’t see them. I have in library lists only my own libraries.
When I was at school I made a couple of cupboards made of matchboxes (8 columns x 9 rows). One for resistors, one for capacitors, one for diodes, … During study I collected in one of them many TTLs (I think more then 500 ICs in total).
The reason of collecting: those time I couldn’t just buy what I needed I only could buy what was at the moment accessible so each IC I was buying in reserve. Then when designing anything I used in design only elements I had in stock to not then wait years until I will be able to assemble my design.
About 5…7 years ago I threw them (ICs, not cupboards) all away expecting no use for them.
That’s pretty much the same trajectory as for most belongings. Either you deal with them now or your estate does later. I can imagine them muttering “what was he thinking” or more candidly “what’s this crap”?
I’m not so concerned about ICs at the moment. Dealing with a large and heavy thing like a power supply can liberate more space in one go than dealing with a box of ICs. Then there are the books (including non-technical). I’ve committed myself to reading one a week or fortnight and then donating it to a book exchange box. No more “I’ll read that some day”.
I count books not by pieces, but by meters. About 10 years ago I recycled around 2m of catalogs (more than 1m was TI).
I’m having trouble getting my wife to do the same at home.
Alright then, you win. 
As retiredfeline already mentioned. People restoring and reverse engineering old stuff. There are also plenty of hobbyists in the “retrocomputing” category, and they also use such IC’s.
It’s also common to add a few shift registers as either extra input or output to a microcontroller. Latches, buffers and line drivers are also used. The analog switches (4051, 4066, 74hc variants, etc) are also widely used.
Sure, the big boards with 100+ ttl IC’s do not get made anymore (for new designs), but all kinds of IC’s from those families are still in widespread use.
For a whacky project, have a look at the link below which has 4 TTL IC’s.
And of course students and courses at schools, when learning and getting some hands on practice with digital logic. The guy from the whacky project above surely learned something about digital logic along the way.
My ‘question’ was written in context of IEEE/IEC logic symbols that I suppose were forced to use by some organizations/industries and not by hobbyists.
Do you think hobbyists reverse engineering old stuff need and use these symbols.
I suppose not, but really I don’t know. I have never used them and they are for me no more informative than standard rectangle with typically inputs on the left and outputs on the right.
I did it also, but last time in 90s. 64 pin microcontroler had enough pins for me till now.
They might if copying an old paper schematic or one from an obsolete PCB system and want it to look the same.
I worked for a large company in the early 80s, and all our schematics used them for a short time. But our customers complained that they couldn’t understand them, so we went back to the traditional logic symbols.
