Potentially useful EDA for OS X

[Andy Peters]

Any update on your Kicad / OSX experiences?

Building on OS X has improved. I was able to build BZR 4768 and it seems stable. I ran into the usual dependency-of-dependency problem. I haven't tried anything newer, although I see various complaints about build failures on the user list.

They've introduced this "kiface" weirdness which I don't understand, and they've also got a new library format for footprints, which I haven't migrated to. And there's also some way to keep the libraries in a git repository, and everyone knows git is a fail.

It broke the 3D viewer, which for some reason refuses to find the models. I know it's got something to do with environment variables which I've set yet which pcbnew fails to recognize.

So one day I'll actually finish my monitor controller design and build it. I just keep changing the features.

-a

 

[ruairioflaherty]

Thanks Andy, I appreciate the feedback. 

After some research Diptrace is my current front runner, I'm not sure I have the patience for the open source route.  My needs will be fairly simple - 2 or 3 layer boards in TH and SMD.

I'm going to pick up a dedicated PC for the bench to set up Tina and whatever PCB layout app I buy.  I have a nice Apple 23 inch screen so hopefully I can score a PC on the cheap.

Cheers,
Ruairi

 

[Andy Peters]

Thanks Andy, I appreciate the feedback. 

After some research Diptrace is my current front runner, I'm not sure I have the patience for the open source route.  My needs will be fairly simple - 2 or 3 layer boards in TH and SMD.

Diptrace actually runs on OS X; it's packaged to run under WINE, and the one time I tried it to see what it could do it seemed stable.

I'm going to pick up a dedicated PC for the bench to set up Tina and whatever PCB layout app I buy.  I have a nice Apple 23 inch screen so hopefully I can score a PC on the cheap.

Why set up a dedicated PC? Run Windows 7 in a VMWare virtual machine.

-a

 

[ruairioflaherty]

Thanks Andy, I have used one other app under WINE and it seemed to to work well.

The dedicated PC is all about having a defined workspace.  I'm finding as life goes on that the promise of having access to everything everywhere is not really all that for me.  I had a bench in the house for about 6 months and had a dedicated Mac Mini with bootcamp and found I got more focussed work done on my projects than ever before.