Update to KiClearance to auto-generate clearance rules from a simple table

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Dear all,

i’d like to announce KiClearance version 0.2.0 !

See also previous post

KiClearance auto-generates the clearance distance rules for your KiCad layout.
We have added some new features

  • the initial table is generated out of the given kicad file (this step has to be done before manually)
  • the rules are are less in total, so the routing is faster as KiCad has to deal with less rules then before

New version is available on pypi and can be installed as usual in your python virtual environment, e.g. pip install kiclearance
Code, Docs and usage: GitHub - upb-lea/KiClearance: Generate clearance rules for KiCAD by a human-readable easy-to-use table.
grafik

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Adresses partly this topic

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While I have not used this for myself I think it’s a good tool and I have pointed already some people to the github repo.

Regarding the description on the github site there is a small mistake (affecting kicad v9+v10 users):

If two network classes are assigned to a connection by mistake, this is displayed as an error in the Electrical Rules Checker (Inspect → Electrical Rules Checker).

This is sadly not true anymore - it was changed with kicad v9. Sadly such errors now are allowed behaviour.

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Thanks for this hint.

Trying to add such a feature (detect more than one Netclass to a single net) to KiClearance, i am questioning myself how to get the information.

  • .kicad_sch file contains just the graphical coordinates of all the elements, also from netclasses, but no real usable information which net is linked to which netclass
  • kicad_pcb file contains no net class information at all
  • kicad_pro contains general net class information, but not what class is linked to a net

Do you have any suggestion how to get this information with a 3rd party script, as KiClearance is?

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No solution from me (only user, no real programmer apart from microcontroller stuff).

Maybe some other @KiCad_Developers can help?

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i found out, that the linked netclasses to nets can be found in .kicad_pro file, and so i can check for multiple net classes are assigned to a single net.
I have updated the KiClearance tool accoringly, an error is rised in this case.

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