I want to import a series of text netlists into eeschema to create schematic diagrams for otherwise undocumented fairly ancient PCBs (I do not need to create PCB layouts) for fault-finding. I can do it manually in eeschema by reading the netlists and recreating the components and connections, but this can be labour intensive and can be error prone.
Is there a way of automating the process in eeschema?
I appreciate that I would need to modify the netlist into a set format and ensure the components match ones in the symbol library and I would have to re-arrange/drag the components manually into order. Possible in KiCad eeschema?
This will be difficult with the current way Eeschema works.
First, there is no scripting API in Eeschema yet so you would have to directly write the schematic file outside of Eeschema. Granted, the file format is ASCII based and published. But this means you would need to recreate or imitate much of the Eeschema back-end to access the same resources that Eeschema does.
Second, is the way Eeschema handles nets. Nets are directly defined by drawing the lines and/or using labels. Adding a line (or label) creates a net connection. Deleting (or disconnecting) a line (or label) removes a net connection. Rats nests (i.e. unconnected logical net connections) doesn’t exist as a concept in Eeschema. (This is also why back-annotating net connection changes from Pcbnew is impractical.)
Thanks for the reply, obviously not the answer I’d like as I was really hoping I was missing something simple - though I knew it was a bit of a longshot.
Looks like it’ll have to be manual netlist to schematic conversions after all, I’ll probably code something to convert the original and eeschema output netlist to a standard format so I can at least diff for errors.