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KiCad

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Developer(s)Jean-Pierre Charras
Repository
Operating systemFreeBSD, Linux, MS-Win, Mac OS X (experimental)
Available inMultilingual (8)
TypeEDA
LicenseGNU GPL
Websitehttp://kicad.sourceforge.net
KiCAD Eeschema for Schematic capture.
KiCAD PCBnew to create the PCB layout.
3D View using KiCAD PCBnew (Wings 3D based).

KiCad is an open source software suite for electronic design automation (EDA) - designing schematics of electronic circuits and printed circuit boards (PCB). KiCad is developed by Jean-Pierre Charras. And features an integrated environment between schematic capture, bill of materials list, and PCB layout.

Parts

KiCad software is organized in five main parts:

  • kicad - the project manager.
  • eeschema - the schematic capture editor.
  • cvpcb - the footprint selector for components used in the circuit design.
  • pcbnew - the PCB layout program. It also has 3D View.
  • gerbview - the Gerber (photoplotter documents) viewer.

Features

Compared to the other free software alternatives, KiCad solves all stages with the same interface: Schematic Capture, PCB layout, Gerber generation/visualization and library editing.

KiCad is cross-platform, written with WxWidgets to run on FreeBSD, Linux, MS-Win and Mac OS X. A lot of component libraries are available. Also migrating tools for components are available (from other EDA software tools). File formats are plain text and well documented, which is good for CVS or SVN and to make automated component generation scripts.

Multiple languages are supported, such as English, Portuguese, Spanish, Czech, Polish, French, German, and Russian.

Symbol Libraries
Projects
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