Hi Everyone. I’ve created a simple header that doesn’t completely work when selected from my parts and dropped onto the breadboard. Connecting a wire from a breadboard hole to any of the 4 pins works properly and moving the connector to the breadboard shows all 4 lining up and snapping into place correctly. But the vertical rows of breadboard pins do not turn green as other built in parts do which I assume has something to do with my header pins not having red halos like the built in parts do.
I’ve compared the svg xml’s using Inkscape of the ones that work and the ones that don’t (mine) but can’t determine what’s wrong. Hope this isn’t a question that gets asked a lot but I wasn’t able to find an answer. Thanks in advance for any help!
I am not the expert, but from what I have seen on the forum so far, it helps to attach your part, or a link to it.
It sounds a little like your header might have defined female connectors where it should have male ones. I believe only the male ones will properly connect to the breadboard.
Definitely. When you do not understand why a problem is occurring, the description you provide might also not include the detail that makes it easy for us to figure out.
That would be my guess as well.
“properly” could be a bit misleading. “Automatically when positioned over” is more accurate. The reasoning is that only male connector “pins” will “plug in” to the female “holes” in the breadboard. Another female connector is lined up, but not connected.
This is set in the fzp (definition) file, not the svg. Look at the connectors in Parts Editor (assuming you are using that to build the part).
That is the the hint that the connectors are set to female. Fritzing puts the red “halo” around male connectors that do not have any wire(s) attached, and green when there is a wire that leads to another connector (whether the other end is male or female). Female connectors do not get the halo.
The CORE female header in BB view has red pins, but a female header on a shield doesn’t have red pins. A wire between a header on the same part stays red, but it should turn green when connected to another part.
That female header part is defined internally as having type="male" for the connectors. The PART is a female header, but the CONNECTOR is still set to male.
Thank you all flaix, microMerlin, & Old_Gray. I changed the sex in fritzing and that fixed the problem! In trying to fix the problem earlier, not knowing about the sex thing, I opened the BreadBoard svg in Inkscpae of a header part that was working properly. I then selected all and copied it. Next I opened the BB svg of my part that wasn’t working and pasted the copied (working header) to it and saved it.
After that I opened my nonworking part in fritzing’s new part editor and selected the working header’s pins instead of the nonworking ones. I saved everything in fritzing and was anxious to see that I had fixed the problem but on such luck - the header pins that were working correctly and copied from another file evidently got switched to female:(
If you can’t code XML directly you can’t make parts, because there is no way to generate an internal female part in FZ and just paste that svg into your drawing. Basically all shields with female headers are 3 step, 3 discipline, 3 program, part making. Probably 80% of the FZ users don’t know svg drawing or XML coding, so it’s a steep path if you want custom parts.
@Old_Grey Shield parts are definitely more complex, for more reasons than just connector types. Often multiple headers, which are not all on the same grid alignment.
The Fritzing specification of when a connector is male or female has nothing to do with what is in the svg files. The svg connector information is the same for both cases. The type is “stored” in the .fzp file, and “managed” in parts editor on the “Connectors” tab. The “type” shown at the end of the line with the connector id is a set of selection boxes. Male, Female, and Pad (for SMD). Selecting the correct one of those should handle everything except parts that have smd pads on both top and bottom (the pcb edge connectors). Because I do know xml, and had other frustrations getting Parts Editor to do what I wanted (cleanly), I do not use it. But the capability exists. You do not HAVE to know xml/code to create regular/simple parts. Knowing that (and the associated Fritzing usage of them) provides additional options and enhancement opportunities.
I figured it out. Basically you were telling us the mechanism, but not how to fix it. When 3Dirk said he changed the gender I started thinking about how he did it, and that’s when it clicked. The Inspector doesn’t change the pin gender, it only changes the drawing gender. You have to select the gender in Connectors, and then the pins have no colour. I’m back down to 2 steps, 2 disciplines, 2 programs, ie, no XML.