Stacked pins with explicit numbering

[Heath_Raftery]

I’ve just submitted a feature request to show explicit pin numbers for stacked (overlapping) pins.

We’ve been swimming against the tide and re-drawing our symbols without stacked pins, because not being able to see at a glance the connections to every pin number has bit us in the arse a few times now. Most recently it was when we made a late change from a QFN package to a TSSOP for an IC that appeared 3 times on our board. In part due to the pins being stacked, we didn’t notice that the pin count had changed between the packages. Thus the pins were no longer numbered correctly because several NCs were inserted in the pin list.

I’d love to adopt the pin stacking convention, but we just can’t bring ourselves to do it until every pin number is visible.

Two questions for this thread:

1. Does this sound like the best solution to the pin stacking ambiguity?
2. Any tips on other ways to ensure miss-pinning doesn’t slip by our internal reviews?

[janvi]

Stacked pins also generated question marks as a Kicad speciality when I recognized them first in my design. For own symbols I deviate from datasheet using GND1, GND2 … GNDn instead GND only to keep pin names unique. For symbols from lib you can trust the skilled Kicad librarians. If not, always make shure the copper is correct.