Common parts and new part options
First of all, I have to say how much I love Fritzing. Before I found it, I was actually considering writing my own! Thank goodness I didn't! Anyway, after using Fritzing a bunch for both big and small projects, I've come up with a comprehensive list of the basic things I thought missing. Most of them are simple changes to existing parts' graphics, sometimes in only one mode/view.
New parts, in order of importance:
- Zener diode
- Vertically-mounted resistors (i.e. standing on end they only cover two holes of a breadboard or pcb)
- Variable count DIP switches
- Axial electrolytic capacitor
- Non-rectifier diodes (e.g. silicon, Germanium)
- Vertical mount basic potentiometers (in my experience, most are, yet they aren't included?)
- Phototransistor (available alone or paired with an IR led as an encoder)
- The most common of the ubiquitous 7400 series logic ICs (basic 2 and 3 input ANDs, ORs, NORs, NANDs, and XORs; also JK, D, and T flip-flops; line drivers/buffers and inverters; basic multiplexers and demultiplexers). The only way these would be different from the generic chip part is in the schematic view, where for instance, an inverter might have a line with a triangle and a circle in the middle (the NOT symbol) from the input pin to the output pin of the chip. This way you can see which pins correspond to which inputs and outputs of various gates. Plus the 7400 series is the defacto standard for most electronics hobbyists common (the most common for basic logic).
- Solar cell panels (with adjustable row/column counts, voltage, and amperage)
- Molded inductor, also with a vertical-mount option (looks just like a resistor, except instead of a tan-ish background, its almost always a kind of teal-aquamarine)
- Tantalum, monolithic, and mylar film capacitors
- Pager motor
- Solarbotic's Ardweeny (the only differences between it and the atmega 186 is that the newest versions use an atmega 386 and the breadboard graphic is different. Otherwise the same pinout and schematic symbol)
- Ribbon cables and multi-strand twisted wires (of customizable # of wires)
- Simple fuse
- Mini-lightbulb
- Resistor array
- Adjustable size transformer (I'm not really sure how this'd work...)
- Editable value field for caps, zener diodes, inductors, photoresistors, thermistors, etc. (huge)
- A generic editable part number field for all parts (or at least transistors, fets, & non 7805 voltage regs; also huge).
- Batteries can be AA, AAA, C, D, 2032 button cell, generic button cell, and 9v (for AA and AAA options for 1 to 8 batteries in a pack)
- Adjustable length leads for flat-lying parts such as resistors, axial capacitors, molded inductors etc.
- Adjustable voltage ratings for basic parts (and amperage rating for fuse)
- Adjustable diameter footprints for capacitors on pcbs. Also kinda along these lines, it would be better if ceramic caps didn't automatically turn to electrolytic caps after a certain point. You do sometimes get a multiple uF ceramic cap and often electrolytic capacitors < 1 uF.
- An option to hide either the full nest or only those nets which haven't been routed (the "don't autoroute this trace" is a pain because there is no way to do it in batch, plus I have found it unreliable). This way I can make my schematic look pretty, and if one net still hasn't been routed, I can fix it without autorouting everything (Alternatively there could be an "autoroute unrouted nets only" button)
- An option to set one's primary mode as either the breadboard (default), schematic, or pcb view. What I mean by this is, set the mode for which the other two modes autoroute based on. For now, the primary mode is always breadboard view. I usually prefer, however to skip breadboarding and jump right into the schematic. The problem with this though is that for some reason, in trying to sync the breadboard view with parts and wires created in other views, seemingly random connections are made to the breadboard. And so if I autoroute the pcb view having designed the circuit in schematic view, often it does not correspond, and the precise differences can be hard to find. Basically I don't want to be locked into designing the breadboard layout first, then the schematic, then the pcb, if perhaps all i want is a schematic or pcb (usually the case).
- Snap to grid option in both schematic and pcb modes (pretty please!)
- Top down view on all parts in breadboard mode except chips (esp. caps & transistors)
- Custom color LEDs (would therefore take care of request for yellow and green)
- Breadboards with arbitrary row counts, column-per group counts, and connected-column-group counts
- Variable capacitor for audio/radio applications
- Fader
Thanks for the big list. We'll likely reply in more detail later, but a couple of points first thing: you can already independently hide any layer, including ratsnest--go to the View menu where all the layers are listed and you can toggle them on and off. Custom color LEDs might be implemented at some point, but yellow and green are already available--drop any LED on onto your sketch, select it, and in the inspector widget you will see a drop down menu that lets you swap between blue, green, red, white, yellow.
Cheers,
- j
Hi 0x24a537r9,
Thanks indeed for extensive test and list of requested features. To quickly respond to your new feature suggestion #2 (An option to set one's primary mode to some other than breadboard).
I like the suggestion. I could especially envision pro users to want to skip the breadboard and start directly from schematic. I think our initial idea and ideal workflow was that every mode is always synchronized and just a different view on the same model. Of course with complex routing issues, jumper and in the future more advanced pcb options (double sided pcb, different part orientation e.g. vertically mounted resistors only in pcb, not in breadboard or vise versa, different part sizes e.g. through hole parts in breadboard, smd in pcb ...) this simple paradigm cannot be strictly uphold forever.
As Jonathan also mentions in this related thread: http://fritzing.org/forum/thread/197/ the synchronization issue is a general one, which could also explains your "seemingly random connections ... to the breadboard". Solving that issue will surely help jumping to schematic right away.
But as I outlined, I also see that the a pcb in the future might have so much more options, that full synchronization might not change the fact that a common workflow in working with electronics and designing and making prototypes is specialization: going from rough ideas tested on a breadboard to ever more specialized versions only possible (and getting "locked in") on a pcb.
Thanks!
dirk
Post a Reply
Please login to post a reply.
