1 - Introduction

1.1 - Description

The Kicad suite is a group of programs for schematics and PCBs that is available for the following operating systems:

• LINUX

• Windows XP/2000

The kicad utility program is a project manager that facilitates the use of the various programs required to draw schematics, lay out PCBs, generate and check the production files.

The programs included are:

• Eeschema: the schematic editor.

• Pcbnew: the PCB editor.

• Cvpcb: enables the association of schematic components with physical modules (packages) for placement on the PCB.

• Gerbview: is used to visualise Gerber files.

2 - Installation and configuration

2.1 - Display options

It is recommended to set your display/graphics card to use 24 or 32 bits per pixel.

The 16-bit mode will work for Eeschema, but in Pcbnew the display will not function correctly under Linux in this mode.

2.2 - Linux versions: installation

It is standard and recommended practice (though not strictly necesary) to place the kicad directory structure under /usr/local. Other installation locations are perfectly possible, but if KiCad is unable to find libraries or other files, the directory /usr/local/kicad will always be searched.

1. Become root .

2. Copy the file kicad.tgz into the directory /usr/local. It is also possible to use the file kicad.zip (at the price of an extra installation step explained below).

3. Run the command: tar zxvf kicad.tgz (or unzip kicad.zip). The kicad directory, its subdirectories and files will be created.

4. Optionally, odify the file /etc/profile (or whatever the standard config file for your Linux distribution is – possibly /usr/.profile), in order to add to the PATH line the path to the binaries of Eeschema (/usr/local/kicad/linux). Do not use symbolic links, because Eeschema needs to know the real path in order to find other files (default configuration, online help files, ...)

5. It may be necessary/desirable to change the file permissions. By default, the files are world-readable and world-executable (if executable) but only writable by the owner - root.
   If the kicad.zip file was used for the installation, it will be necessary to make executable the following 5 files:
   kicad, pcbnew, eeschema, cvpcb, gerbview and the wyoeditor text editor in the kicad/linux directory (command: chmod +x kicad).

6. Eeschema uses the function keys F1 to F4 (zooms). They should not be reassigned. Under KDE, use the configuration menu for KDE to delete these reassignments if the zoom functions are inactive.

Notes :

Any modification of profile or .profile will only take effect after a new login.

Under KDE, it is possible to create an icon that runs the kicad project manager. It is preferable to run the kicad project manager rather than Eeschema directly, for the project management functions kicad offers (the binary for kicad is located in /usr/local/linux). The simplest method is to copy

/usr/local/linux/kicad.desktop onto the desktop.

2.3 - Windows versions: installation

1. Copy the Kicad directory and its subdirectories to the disk of your choice ( C:, D:, ... )
2. Create an icon to run the kicad.exe project manager.
   It is preferable to run the kicad project manager rather than Eeschema directly, for the project management functions kicad offers. The binary for kicad is located in disk:\kicad\winexe\, where disk is the installation disk (C:, D:, ...)

Note 1 :

EESchema can be installed on a server and used from client computers without difficulty (this was an original design goal).

Note 2 :

Removal of the software is trivial – it is sufficient to delete the kicad directory and the kicad icon.

2.4 - Initialisation of the default configuation

A default configuration file (kicad.pro) is supplied in kicad/template. It serves as the template for each new project. It can be modified or added to if necessary, usually for the list of libraries to load. Run Eeschema via kicad or directly (Linux command; /usr/local/kicad/linux/eeschema). Update the configuration and then save it in /usr/local/kicad/template/kicad.pro

2.5 - Kicad: principles of use

In order to manage simply a project, i.e. all the files it constitutes (representing schematics, printed circuit boards, supplementary libraries, manufacturing files for phototracing, drilling and automatic component placement), it is recommended to create a project:

• Create a working directory for the project (using kicad or by other means).
• In this directory, use kicad to create the project file (file .pro) via the icon.

It is strongly recommended to use the same name for the project and its directory.

Kicad creates a file with a .pro extension that maintains a number of parameters relating to project management (such as the filename of the principal schematic, list of libraries used in the schematics and PCBs). The default names of both the principal schematic and the printed circuit board are based upon the name of the project. Thus, if a project called example was created in a directory called example, the default files created would be:

example.pro	project management file.
example.sch	principal schematic file.
example.brd	printed circuit board file.
example.net	netlist file.
example.xxx	various files created by the other utility programs.
example.cache.lib	cache file of the libraries used in the schematic (backup of the components used)

3 - Use

3.1 - Main window

The main window is composed of a tree view of the project, a pane containing buttons used to run the various utilities, and a message window. The menu and the toolbar can be used to create, read and save project files (*.pro).

3.2 - Utility launch pane

The buttons correspond to the following commands:

3.3 - Project tree view

3.4 - Toolbar: