i used KiCAD8 for several Days and i love it.
The Idea to use a Database for an better handling with Components are great, so i have install the HTTP JSON Version and it works fine.
Now i am wondering how i get the Symbol and Footprint Names out of KiCAD, without writing a new Plugin.
My Idea:
If you have a Database for all your Components, it gives you a great possibility to handel all your Parts and Orders and projects and and and…
But to pick the Footprintname and Symbolname for each Komponent by Hand and copy this into another Software, are a Bad way to wasting your Time.
My idea was to take a list from KiCAD with all the Names and Import it into a new External Software that handels the Components and so on.
With a PullDown menue, the Footprint/Symbol Selecting and Changing are a easier way.
So my question are:
Is there a way to collect the Data or came this Feature in the Future?
A little programming by you and you should be able to write a script (not even a plugin) extract the symbol names by parsing the S-expression files that are the symbol libraries. For the footprint libraries it’s even easier, you just need to enumerate the filenames in the .pretty directories.
Thank you! If KiCAD dont Support another Way, then i need to scan the Folder and Pick the Data by my self. I was a little confused that KiCAD supports a Database (Input) but dont Supports the other Way (Output) to get Data automaticly from KiCAD for handling things like Part List for Projects, Librarys… .
I think here hat KiCAD a lot of Work to do.
KiCad supports an interface to Databases, but the database itself is outside of the KiCad project. Setting up a database (nearly?) always needs a bit of programming, and I guess that writing a script to read in S-expressions and extract part names is a trivial part of that.
KiCad has extensive options to export BOM lists - formatted in multiple ways. There are additionally third party BOM exporters like KiBOM and others that manage exports and can be used to communicate with your manufacturer.
I’m unclear what the issue is here. The database model is mainly aimed at group use and distributed availability. One issue is that the database only holds the links to the symbols and footprints and the actual assets are held locally. However, this still allows you to select items from you companies curated set of components and to allocate appropriate symbols and footprints by inserting appropriate links to the assets within the database. All of this might require a bit of SQL knowledge and a few tricks such as selective use of ‘VIEWS’.
The database can be part of a bigger system like SAP and this is a way of ensuring the project uses validated parts. The BOM outputs can easily be configured to pull in appropriate data of to generate stock requests etc.
You can use the Python Console in the PCB Editor (or, in Schematic Editor).
Simply “Paste and Run” the code below. Note: Use the “Paste and Run” See Video
Use a Text or Code Editor to change the ‘my_dir’ to the file location you want.
And, you can set the Glob(“.”) to the file type you want, if just wanting to list specific file types. Example: (“.kicad_mod”)
EDIT: I should have showed using the Kicad Symbols folder before make video. Screenshot shows partial/list result of the symbols folder list…
import glob,os
my_dir = “/Users/bruce/Programming/Proj_Python_new/myPython_Codes/File_Listiing/”
os.chdir(my_dir)
for file in glob.glob(“.”): # all files
print(file)
