DIY Layout Creator - software for easy drawing PCB, vero and perfboard layouts

[c101aviojet]

First of all Barnislav, thanks for your effort and time! It's helping me "translate" a Lovetone schematic into a layout.
I have a couple of suggestions, I hope I'm not repeating them for the n-th time. Perhaps you find them useful in some way and can implement some.

1- Add "rotary switch tool" (the typical Lorlin 12 pin switch would be great). While having the "rotary switch" tool selected, it would be nice to see a circle around the pointer to have an idea of the space required.
2- Add "hole tool", which would allow you to simply make a X size hole in the PCB. Useful to fix it inside the enclosure (with a nylon stand-off mount, for example).
3- Add adjustable size for solder pads and traces, to solder outboard wires or draw traceds which carry a certain power, for example.
4- Improve speed. For some reason, the program gets very, very slow when the PCB grows a bit (at least, that's what happens to me).
5- Add "photocell" and "photocell+LED tool".
6- Be able to change the grid size. Sometimes, I feel the need to place a component "halfway" between two more as you see in many PCBs. If the grid spacing could be made smaller, then that would be possible.
7- This one may be particularly stupid, but... how about using a certain picture as background? That way, you could "copy" a layout quite easily. You should be able to move and resize the image to make it match the pads.
8- Add "tag tool". It would add a small, visible, lightly coloured note pointing to the selected component, for example, "to 9V+ input" in a solder pad.
9- Be able to select several items at once in the PCB, the same way you can select several icons in a windows desktop.
10- Component size changes according to its ratings. For example, should you specify a 2W resistor instead of the typical 1/4W one, then by defect it would require a spacing of 6 pads and it's size would grow accordingly.

Thanks again!

[bancika]

regarding all "Add this component, add that component" requests: folks, remember that we're still in development stage, I'm changing engine pretty often and that requires updating all component files. More files I have, more work and time I need for updating these files. I try to keep component count to minimum that allows me to test engine realistically.
Also, I told this before, but let's repeat: do NOT use this version to draw anything you plan using later, you won't be able to open layout files even with the next beta I plan to release. However, it's nice to do the testing in real-life, so feel free to play with it as much as possible.

c101aviojet, you can already set pad and trace size, you can also place components outside grid (see few posts back), you can insert external images, select more than one component...just try

As for component size/rating, it's nice but not so practical. Different types of resistors will have different sizes: carbon/metal/carbon comp. The best way is to manually specify diameter and length. That way, you're sure it's exactly the same size as component that's supposed to be used.

As for speed, did you try to save layout, restart app and load it again? Some folks say it helps. I hope that's the case, it probably means I have some memory issues.

cheers

[c101aviojet]

I'm sorry I'm telling you what half the forum memebers must have already said. Don't get me wrong, but reading 64+ pages seemed just to much.
Also, excuse me for asking for things that are already in... 
As for the components, just don't worry, when you find a suitable engine then add what you think of. Regarding sizing, I thought it would be useful in those cases that you are not familiar with that component and have no clue of shape/size, etc. The ratio benefits/work looks quite low, though. Maybe if the components library could be easily edited, then you could upload it and share it with others, and add weird components too.
And yes, I've tried restarting the program, but doesn't help much in my case.
Keep up the good work!

[bside2234]

It slows down on me too. I just save and restart and it works fine again.

"6- Be able to change the grid size. Sometimes, I feel the need to place a component "halfway" between two more as you see in many PCBs. If the grid spacing could be made smaller, then that would be possible."

I asked the same thing. You can hold control and place a component anywhere you want without snapping to grid.

It would be nice if the rulers were more precise (more marks).

[bancika]

And yes, I've tried restarting the program, but doesn't help much in my case.

do you have stripboard or perfboard on your layout? those components are not optimized well and require too much time to draw. Try without them until I come up with better idea how to implement those.
I hope I'll find where memory leak is, that's most likely what's going on with bside2234 and other guys. I'm used to other programming languages where you have to free memory manually so maybe I'm missing something with Java garbage collector. I don't like GC so far

I'll try to make more ticks on rulers.

cheers,
Bane

[bancika]

Hi all,
new version is up!, here's link http://www.storm-software.co.yu/diylc/diylc_beta.zip
Brief list of changes:
-added "sticky points" option, when you join two control points they will move together. When this option is on, holding shift will temporarily turn it off in case you need it off just for a second and the other way round  (with option off and shift pressed points will be sticky).
-added option to check for application update from the web. It's sophisticated so it only lists changes made between version you have installed and latest version.
-added few new components
-fixed bunch of issues and maybe introduced a few new

[bancika]

I almost forgot, you can drag selected component from library to the layout and it will be created at that place.

[ezanker]

It's looking better and better!!! 

For me the library keeps disappearing from sight.  I then move the mouse over it and the scrollbar reappears, then if I randomly click where the components should be they start reappearing too.  Also I can press F5 twice to toggle off and then on the library to bring it back to sight.  It seems to disappear after placing components, but sometimes just after some time of inactivity.  Do you have some functions running on a timer?

Again, I have Windows XP Service Pack 2 on a laptop with 2GB ram and a decent video card. (I'm the one who was seeing the components flicker in a early alpha until I updated my java).

I guess I am the only one experiencing this?
Erik

P.S. I know what you mean about the Garbage Collector.  I'm program in C#.Net and we're always wondering exactly what the GC does and when.  Memory leaks are reduced, but sometimes a program holds on to memory for a long time...

[bancika]

yeah, I didn't really start working on memory leaks yet, I just cleaned up some stuff that was obviously making it consume more memory and work slower.
cheers

[hgamal]

Hi all,
new version is up!, here's link http://www.storm-software.co.yu/diylc/diylc_beta.zip

I could not open this file created on the old beta!

http://gamal.com.br/marshallizer.diy

I've got "java.lang.NullPointerException".

[bancika]

see bolded sentance about 8 posts ago

[hgamal]

see bolded sentance about 8 posts ago

ok!    (that hurts!)

[bancika]

yeah, I should put info message inside program or something. I said it here for a few times, though...

[bside2234]

It is progressing along very nice. Good Job!

[BINGEWOOD]

copy/paste seems to be working too.  I noticed that the highlight doesn't seem to be coming up when you select/click on a component.

edit:

I see, it turns on once a change happens i.e. move.

[arma61]

Hi

-added "sticky points" option, when you join two control points they will move together. When this option is on, holding shift will temporarily turn it off in case you need it off just for a second and the other way round  (with option off and shift pressed points will be sticky).

It seems CTRL key is doing the same task, so when you move a component "free" (holding the CTRL key) it will also "disconnect" from the other comp/traces.

Armando

[bancika]

yeah, that's said here few times before...I'll have to start thinking about quick user guide or something...

[mdh]

Has anyone managed to get DIYLC 2 running in Debian/Ubuntu? hgamal, I've seen that you've managed to get it running under Fedora.

I posted on p. 56 of this thread that I had the alpha running under Ubuntu Dapper with the Sun Java packages, and now I have the beta running under Gutsy Gibbon (7.10), and this time I didn't have to do anything special.  I guess Sun Java installs by default now.  I can't check the Dapper machine because it's on hiatus with hardware problems.

[bancika]

this is like japanese to me 

ubuntu dapper
gutsy gibbon
hiatus

[bside2234]

Yeah, I was thinking the same thing.

Flibber Flabber
Wakka Wakka

Ever hear of a little program called Windows?