KiCad Setup

• The best instructions for setting up the base KiCad program is found on their site. Follow the instructions for your operating system. https://www.kicad.org/
• The Glitchy board was made using Kicad 8.0.4. Please make sure you are using the same version or at least a newer one.

Tips

• Use the plugin manager in the main launching window to install some addons. These are the ones I use
• Interactive HTML BOM (org.openscopeproject.InteractiveHtmlBom)
  • This plugin will allow you to generate an interactive webpage with a list of all the parts, their details, board image, and interactive placement highlighting. It's very handy for building your board by hand or debugging it.
• Fabrication Toolkit (com.github.bennymeg.JLC-Plugin-for-KiCad)
  • I chose to have the board made by JLCPCB. This plugin helps generate the needed files and add fields that allow for easy adjustment for the assembly parts placement. Highly recommended.
• Solarized-dark theme (com.github.pointhi.kicad-color-schemes.solarized-dark)
  • Not needed at all, just a nice color scheme.

Other Tips

EasyEDA2KiCad

This project allows you to pull from the proprietary part library JLCPCB uses in their assembly options, EasyEDA. You can read about this project on this hackaday post. Here is a link to the github project: https://github.com/uPesy/easyeda2kicad.py#-installation. It's not perfect, but it saves a lot of time.

JLC PCB SMD Assembly Component Catalogue

This project let's you search the EasyEDA catalog of parts much much easier. The project github is here: https://github.com/yaqwsx/jlcparts
You don't have to host the project yourself, you can use the project as it's hosted directly on github here: https://yaqwsx.github.io/jlcparts/#/