KiCad 7 or KiCad 8?

Software
1

I’m still in v7 for some projects while some projects are in v8. Do you see any reasons, regarding plugins or other specific functions regarding stability etc, not to leave v7 now?

2

What plugins do you use actively?
If those work or not work, that is a good start at an answer.

If you want you can list the plugins you are concerned about / use actively here, and there might very well be forum members or even plugin maintainers who can give you advice and information regarding them.

I have not found 8.0.1 to be especially buggy, but have to admint that the last project I did was in 8.99 from beginning of april, perhaps april 7 or so… (Not even that was impossible, although it was a comparatively small and simple project.)

2 Likes
3

Thanks hmk. Currently these have been used/tested:

  1. Via Stitching Generator: (Simple and good plugin! One might wonder why it’s not included as a standard function in KiCad.)

  2. Generate Interactive HTML BOM: (A fantastic plugin! Would be even better if it was searchable even when not opening the HTML file, allowing the OS to search inside the HTML as text/some kind of Index, when searching for component values/names/manufacturer numbers searched in Mac OS Finder or Windows Explorer or what the function may be called in Linux).

  3. Thermal Relief Via

  4. Round Tracks: Have just shorty tested it but not yet used it as “reset/remove round tracks” is not included. This function is very cool but has to be non-destructive (reset/remove included).

  5. Fabrication Toolkit

  6. Transform It

  7. Archive 3D Models

Overall, why do some and some don’t show up as an Icon on the menu bar?

4

v8 is okay in the stability front, but I had some crashes on 8.0.1, have not tested 8.0.2 yet.

for your plugins:

Not part of the PCM and there seem to be some issues with v8. development seems to be not really active as well so you have to try with this one for yourself.

proven to work for v8 (I use it actively). If you want to make the HTML searchable, I think deactivating the Enable compression option under Html defaults should do the trick.

works with v8

can be installed for v8 via PCM so should be compatible (have not tested myself)

works with v8

works with v8

works with v8

you can manually control which plugins to display in the menu bar under Preferences -> Preferences -> PCB Editor -> Action Plugins and then select Show Button for each plugin you want to have in the menu bar.

1 Like
5

Thanks Tojan, this helps a lot!

6

Strangely enough even when disable the “compression” in Generate Interactive HTML BOM: Finder search cannot find/read inside the HTML even if I can find what I search for if I open the HTML in a text editor. If I rename the ibom.html to ibom.txt, finder find it immediately. Hm. This is a MAC/finder setting issue in other words. I tried in windows also, but do not know how to search in there.

7

Anyone have any idea why Finder can’t search and find words inside any HTML file?