I’m completely new to Kicad and wanted to try it out. I have made 100s of PCBs professionally.
I normally have a quick play with new software to get a feel for it. My initial impressions are poor but I’m intrigued why the interface is so strange!
For example:
- as I change modes; wiring, add symbol, add text etc the mouse icon doesn’t change to indicate the mode (apart from an arrow for edit mode) This is so simple to implement and valuable feedback in a GUI for ease of use.
- I connect a couple of components and click and drag a component and it becomes disconnected from the nets (OK I now know that I should press G first) The most important feature of a schematic diagram is the nets - why doesn’t using a mouse work like every other graphics program I use - and move the component while retaining the connectivity?
- I move a component and get connections rubberbanded! Why would anyone want this to happen? Surely the component should move and connections move as required and keep horizontal and vertical.
- Once I have angled connections how do I neaten the them?- a right click and select ‘tidy connections’ would be nice or is it just easier to delete connection and start again?
- I can’t see what item is selected due to a lack of highlighting.
- Selecting an item with a key press (such as G) and then having the item move around with a mouse movement rather than a click and drag I find extremely weird and unintuitive.
- CTRL click to add components to a selection isn’t implemented
I’ve made a simple design and have the components in the PCB editor but have stalled because I have lost confidence in a program that I find so unintuitive. Please can someone explain what I’m doing wrong! Do I just stick with the weirdness and eventually get used to its peculiarities?
Thanks
Al