Schematic? By hand? Why didn’t I think about it?! Who needs EEschema when you’ve got the Notepad!
Besides the files are fine, it is the EEschema that’s can’t process the symbols properly.
How literal are you? When was this bug actually introduced? Currently I’m using a nightly build from Dec 26th.
Ok so now you’re the expert, you tell us how you fixed it:) We can’t wave a magic wand and fix the code for you!
I think you are not really asking for help, you just want to rant a little about the state of KiCad, which seems to be the main reason you post here. You seem to be quite impervious to practical advice.
If it is the bug that was fixed today, then it was introduced within the last few days. If it is something else it might be there a bit longer. (The longest it can be in nightly is the day sym lib stuff has been merged.)
To determine that we would need a bit more details about your exact workflow, your project setup, …
Most importantly:
I’m sorry, my bad! I thought you were making an attempt at humor. The practicality of your advice haven’t quite settled in. Ok, serious now. I don’t know what kind of schematics you are dealing with (if any at all), but my BOM is several hundreds of distinct components.
Now I don’t think you really need to be an expert to come to a conclusion that there might be something wrong with the current version of the software, seeing that the schematic opens just fine with a previous version of the same software.
You might be on to something here. I was really asking for help… preferably from somebody who’s got something …well practical to say on the subject, not just claim that it is practical. Hope you can parse that.
It is like you guys don’t even bother to read the original post
The real cause of this is that the Windows build server was out of action for some time and therefore software changes were not tested properly on Windows.
I tested the conversion taking the advice in the announcement thread into account to make good preparations and had this working with 100% success and all my libraries (including older versions of the projects) converted in early December. Although we had had the problems with the certificates, and another temporary lapse, there has been no reason not to be able to test this in a safe VM if one really wanted to, we have had almost a month now, although one of course could have wished for more time (I did not think about retesting this before now with all the problem reports coming in).
Yes, right now at least the last nightly has the conversion broken, and one should not try to convert, but a fix has already been announced and should be available to test already late tonight (I am on GMT-9 time zone in Alaska) according to @stambaughw.
@ArtG, there might be one other thing that is messing things up for you: There was mention that you had accidentally installed the system environmental variables. (By my opinion these should not have been checked as default in the installer as they are intended for the developers to make it easy to test things and will override the settings in the paths menu. I have accidentally forgot to uncheck these several times and had to clean up.)
You might already know this, I mention it anyway: The problem is that it is hard to clean up after this; a reinstall with these unchecked does not work alone: If using Windows, you need to first get into the registry, search for the path to the KiCad shared folder in the program folder (typically “C:\Program Files\KiCad\share” for a 64-bit Windows version) and delete all the system environment variable entries in the registry belonging to KiCad.*[Edit: It safer to use the Control Panel, or right click Computer-Properties to delete environment variables, see details further down the thread for directions] Then restart the computer. I have also then made another KiCad install with environment variables unchecked just to be sure, but I am not sure that is needed.
This is likely not the solution to all problems, but if it is overriding your settings, pointing KiCad to different paths than you specified under Configure Paths, it is certainly one thing that has to fixed.
It’s a shame this thread has so much of people sniping at each other because there are lots of valid points on both sides. We should all probably aim to be a bit less needlessly harsh-tongued while trying to help each other. Titling the thread “what a mess” probably wasn’t the best start though, to be honest.
I agree, so I changed the title to something a bit more positive.
Finding bugs and helping the developers get it right is the way forward
[quote=“c4757p, post:20, topic:9123”]
. . . . Titling the thread “what a mess” probably wasn’t the best start though, to be honest. [/quote]
Yeah, my mother used to look at my room (or, worse yet, my corner of the basement) and declare “This place is a MESS!!”
And on days when I felt brave I’d reply, “This mess is a PLACE!”.
Dale
Advising people to go into the registry and start deleting stuff is a REALLY REALLY BAD idea.
Environment variables can and should be changed via the Control Panel.
@bobc, I was not aware they could be controlled from there, learning something new. Can you point everybody to how to get there?Just launching the control panel does not leave much clues…
(Editing the registry is not that risky if proper precautions are taken. One will find lots of Microsoft help that involves making such changes. Edit: May be I have gotten too used to deal with it, I could see novice users could mess things up if they were not sure about what they were doing. )
Start->Control Panel->System and Security->System->Advanced system settings->Environment Variables
Thanks, @MitjaN, then users rather should use the control panel way to get rid of the environment variables installed by KiCad by accident than the registry entry edit I pointed to. (I added a note in the original post).
Also
Start->(right-click)Computer->Properties->Advanced System Settings->Environment Variables
Seriously? Google it. You don’t know basic computer maintenance but advise people to edit the registry instead?
Ok, so tell us what those precautions are…! Editing the registry is always risky, and should only be done for specific and necessary changes. Your advice was wrong, unnecessary as well as dangerous.
Let’s look at a typical Microsoft example:
This article is intended for advanced users, administrators, and IT Professionals.
Important This section, method, or task contains steps that tell you how to modify the registry. However, serious problems might occur if you modify the registry incorrectly. Therefore, make sure that you follow these steps carefully. For added protection, back up the registry before you modify it. Then, you can restore the registry if a problem occurs. For more information about how to back up and restore the registry, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:
322756 How to back up and restore the registry in Windows
You obviously lack knowledge to give proper advice, I am seriously asking you to take a step back. It’s not just wrong advice, but dangerous. Please just STOP with bad advice!
Thanks @1.21Gigawatts, that is also very helpful, I have added a pointer to it in the edit of my original post.
That’s rather ironic coming from you 
What snowflake got offended by the word “mess” in the title of my post? If I want to convey to others that when you try to open a schematic with several several hundred symbols and all of them turn into squares with question marks - is a mess, I will jolly well do that! If you don’t like it, feel free to delete the name of the thread, to lock the thread or delete the post altogether but don’t add anything to that which was written by me. I appreciate your creativity, but do so under your own name!