Fritzing-Schematic an Inkscape extension - released

[vanepp]

@Charles_Kalthrop

note I rescaled the svg to be the correct 1 drawing unit = 1 thousandth of an inch to make this easier.

While it is out of date for the current Inkscape version, the process is described here (I will update for the latest Inkscape in a bit.) It isn’t really important, the svg will work the same at any scale, it is just what the part standard calls for and is more familiar to me.

Rescale a svg using Inkscape

I have made the mistake of electing myself “somebody” (as in “somebody should make a parts creation tutorial”) again. As punishment for this rash mistake, a single “here is how I fixed up this part” post has turned in to (so far ) 5 posts. These first three are infrastructure type posts that should be useful standalone. This one covers rescaling a drawing using Inkscape. It is being posted first because the real first document Configure Inkscape refers to this document and I neede…

I’m using Inkscape 1.2.2 (732a01da63, 2022-12-09) which I think is the latest version (last I looked.) The font size change is likely the transforms in the groups, they change the font sizes. I typically ungroup the entire svg as Fritzing only needs a single group with the layerId (breadboard or schematic) except for pcb which needs two or three (depending on if the part is SMD or not.) Ungrouping also removes most transforms which I find desirable. With that done the font sizes are different.

@Charles_Kalthrop

Two copper layers (with all connector pads inside copper0 which is inside copper1)

Only for through hole parts. An SMD part only has copper1 (the top layer)

@Charles_Kalthrop

The need for the schematic to be perfectly aligned with the grid. Is the schematic used for anything other than reference? Do any programs(kiCad or eagle) use it?

It isn’t necessarily a requirement, a schematic will work (sort of) with any alignment, but it won’t match most other parts which is undesirable. The two rules I follow in schematic (as does the extension) are aligns to the 0.1in grid and is small as possible (because space in a schematic is valuable.)

@Charles_Kalthrop

The need for the TerminalID to match the connectorID?

Again any value will work (as long as the fzp file matches the value in the svg) it is just very annoying (and it will cause FritzingCheckPart complaints) to have the internal connector numbers not all match when you are attempting to modify a part. Some of the parts in core parts do this and eventually they will get corrected (but haven’t yet!)

@Charles_Kalthrop

how to make my silkscreen text uniform?

remove the groups to remove the transforms (especially true in pcb, the gerber code in the past sometimes didn’t correctly process transforms and I don’t know if that has been fixed.)

@Charles_Kalthrop

I just realised, I hijacked the original thread. I’m so sorry to the O.P.
I’ll see if I can move the above conversations to another thread.

I don’t thing that is all that easy, and the volume here isn’t high enough to make it all that important.

Peter