Original Summary

Laptops already exist for portable work, and running KiCad on a laptop at a bench works fine until you’re juggling multimeter probes, power leads, and a soldering iron that slips and lands directly on your trackpad. Panning across a dense layout with a patch of melted plastic is miserable. Mostly, I just wanted a flat piece of glass I could prop up next to a physical board to trace nets, check pinouts, and make quick routing changes with a stylus instead of fighting a mouse in a cramped workspace. I’ve spent the last 8 or 9 months building PCBPad (the idea has been rattling around for over a year), an iPadOS app designed to read and edit .kicad_pcb files locally. Where the app stands right now: Opens native KiCad files directly on the device. No cloud round-tripping, everything works offline. Trace routing and component placement adapted for a stylus rather than click-and-drag. Net highlighting, layer toggles, and a lightweight 3D viewer to check component clearances right next to the physical hardware. To be clear on scope: it isn't built to replace desktop KiCad for high-speed multi-layer designs with matched trace lengths and differential pairs. It's meant as an offline bench companion for debugging, reviewing layouts away from a desk. That said, it can handle simpler projects from 0 to 100%. It supports 2, 4, and 6-layer stacks, allows importing your own custom libraries and footprints, and down the road I'm looking at adding a .step file parser for more realistic 3D component renders. The beta is live on TestFlight it will be 100% free even whe fully released: If you use KiCad and have an iPad, I’m looking for feedback on edge cases, especially weird custom footprints or non-standard board outlines that might choke the parser, and whether the Apple Pencil gestures feel usable.   submitted by   /u/More_Recognition_978 [link]   [comments]

  • 情报分类：硬件与数码
  • 分类依据：内容涉及硬件、数码产品或通信卡
  • 信息来源：Reddit · SideProject
  • 发布时间：2026/9/21 15:16:15