KiCad Resources

Installing KiCad 6

The Debian repositories default to KiCad 5... This is dumb.

BUT! KiCad 6 is in the backports & available. So you just have to tell apt to install 6.

"To be able to install versions from a official Debian Backport repository you need to extend your sources.list configuration if not yet happen. If you are running Debian Bullseye please create a file /etc/apt/sources.list.d/bullseye-backports.list if you don’t have an similar entry already."

TLDR:

• sudo /etc/apt/sources.list.d/bullseye-backports.list

Then add in:

# /etc/apt/sources.list.d/bullseye-backports.list
deb http://deb.debian.org/debian bullseye-backports main contrib non-free

Then:

• sudo apt update

(You'll see a whole bunch of warnings about packages being configured multiple times. This is mostly harmless, but annoying.)

& now... The actual install!

For some reason, the good folks at KiCad think that installing their software without any of the supporting data is the way to go... Then they fail to make it obvious anywhere that you need to install the libraries & stuff. (Their instructions only give you the package itself.)

So...

• sudo apt install -t bullseye-backports kicad kicad-doc-en kicad-libraries kicad-packages3d

Then, to verify you have everything you need & they're all the right version:

• dpkg --list | grep kicad

Hints & Tips

Push & Shove

To move traces (& vias) around in PCBNew...

Select the trace (or just hover over it...) & hit "D". The trace (or via) will now follow your cursor around & do it's best to shove other stuff out of the way if it can.

If it shoves something you don't want moved, hit "Esc" to cancel. If you're happy with what it's done, left-click to finish.

(From Contextual Electronics)