I have tested the Linux 64 and Windows 64 versions and both work. Actually the autorouting quality is not bad if components are placed sensibly, in my opinion much better than DesignSparks efforts
Can you explain to me exactly what I need to install and how to install it? I guess I must be doing it wrong. I can get freerouter to open just fine and it has no problem importing my board outline, but that’s all it imports. No components show up and it won’t let me route any traces. I tried to follow your instructions along with everyone else’s but it just isn’t working. The only thing it shows inside the board perimeter it the conductive area.
Any help would be appreciated!
Check the link above. KiCAD needs to know where to find it and where you install it is OS dependent.
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I think that Freerouter can’t handle roundrect pads, it also may have trouble with unicode strings. Otherwise I don’t recall seeing problems with no components loaded at all.
If you could post an example showing the problem (dsn file), then that would help a lot to diagnose it.
I would upload the dsn but the forum says new users aren’t allowed to upload. How do I tell kicad where I installed it? I didn’t see anything about that.
Put it in any cloud storage of your choice and provide a link. (google drive, dropbox, …)
AFAIk, these steps still work:
To enable Freerouter in Kicad:
1 Download Freerouter from this mirror — https://github.com/freerouting/freerouting/archive/master.zip
2 Extract freerouting-master.zip/binaries/freerouting.jar
3 Copy JAR to Kicad bin directory and rename it to freeroute.jar
4 Restart Kicad to enable freerouter middle button in pcbnew. Voila!
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https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0e0-kzp6VJJY2c5emNRbjNTM2M/view?usp=sharing
Here is the link. And I did exactly those directions. It still did this. When I open the DSN, no components. Only the outline of the board. Middle button works fine, takes me where I need to go. Just the DSN isn’t showing up like its supposed to I guess?
There is a problem with a component name:
(component "diesel:TRI-JUMPER"
(place JP101 279908 -46736 front 270 (PN "TRIJUMPER-3X.1""))
)
TRIJUMPER-3X.1" has a quote on the end, so Freeroute can’t parse it.
Workaround: remove quotes from names.
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That worked perfectly. Thank you so much. After I removed that one quote all of my components appeared and its autorouting as we speak. Thank you guys so much!
I’ve installed autorouter by putting the jar under
/Applications/Kicad/kicad.app/Contents/MacOS/freeroute.jar as per Is an autoroute function or Freeroute still available?
I can launch freerouter but I get these classcastexceptions:
and it never seem to finish or show anything:
Help appreciated!
Got it working from the new repo by building from source with ant. I’m on mac, so verbatim for me was:
git clone --depth=1 https://github.com/Engidea/FreeRoutingNew.git
cd FreeRoutingNew
brew install ant
ant
cp deploy/FreeRouting.jar /Applications/Kicad/kicad.app/Contents/MacOS/freeroute.jar
All good it seems, working hard for me:
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Hi there, just wanted to let you know that I created a Java 9 compatible version of freerouting: http://freerouting.mihosoft.eu/.
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I had to go and read up what JDK9 was. Very new stuff.
What is your long term intent with this? If you want to move it forward this might be a good place to get some feedback/help.
I just wanted to make sure this software can survive in the future. I am not a PCB expert but I am starting to use KiCAD (and freerouting) for some Hobby projects. I will probably improve the UX in the future. I am not too much interested in improving the algorithms themselves since for my needs they seem to be sufficient.
But I am happy to maintain the package and integrate improvements from other contributors!
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I can say with certainty I will be using Freeroute until I can achieve the same level of efficiency on a quick interface board using the v5 autorouter. IIUC, the v5 auto-router is computer-assisted and requires a human to select or determine (or accept) route options provided by the v5 auto-router. Do I understand correctly? I’m a newb designing my own PCBs and I haven’t been following v5 autorouter news in detail, is the basic v5 routing workflow described somewhere?
So long as the v7 spectra-format-autorouter export and session import continue to be supported I am satisfied, and understand the argument for removing direct support. I don’t have an issue so long as I can continue to get into and out-of a stand-alone auto-router (i.e. freeroute).
Freeroute appears to be being maintained as part of the commercial proprietary “LayoutEditor” tool suite (http://www.layouteditor.net/), which at first glance appears to be similar to KiCAD but targeted very specifically at multi-chip-on-substrate-type modules. There’s a manual for Freeroute available at https://freerouting.org/ and it has a page for KiCAD. FBOW, the recommended install procedure for Freeroute is to install the free version of LayoutEditor (i.e. what you get if you don’t purchase a license key). The installer doesn’t create a menu selection for freeroute, and you have to browse the install bin directory for the executable and create a desktop short-cut (or copy the jar file to the appropriate kicad/… directory and rename, but that reportedly won’t work in v5 because the menu/button will be gone).
I am somewhat concerned that I couldn’t find a link to the freeroute source on the layouteditor site, but they are claiming GPL so I won’t complain so long as they continue to provide Windows binaries for updates. I’m also pragmatic.
Cheers!
Dale
Doh! I profusely and humbly retract my implied criticism. I will now slink away in shame and send out the fab files for a new pcb…