pcb-rnd knowledge pool

Abstract: n/a

The best next topics that could be build very easily on top of the getting started video, in the format of 5..10 minute videos Below is a list of potential topics:

• (done: arc tool (with drag&drop editing angle and radius graphically))
• (done: text tool, with text size, text line thickness)
• poly tool with explaining "as drawn" and "clipped", how rectangle is the same as poly, how slicing up the polygon normally keeps the biggest island only, how to do polygon holes and how a manually drawn poly hole differs from clearances (I'd leave out the poly-clears-poly part, that's real advanced stuff, not intermediate that we should target with this set)
• the insert tool: how it works with lines, arcs and polygons
• object visibility, selection preference on single click, cycle-drag on dragging, positive and negative box selection; "selection group", shift-select trick&tips how to select what you want to select
• how everything has context menus by now; show how easily various aspects of object, layers, layer groups can be changed using context menus
• how to use the property editor, including how to get statistics on or how to unify a property of multiple objects
• an important topic that's real confusing first: operation on "object" (object under the cursor) vs. operation on "selected"
• paste buffers: how to copy&paste, how to use it to transfer stuff from one board to another, how there are multiple buffers
• layer binding in case of buffers and in case of subcircuits
• padstack libraries, the per board, per subcircuit padstack lib concept, how to load/save padstacks, how to keep a local "lib" of padstacks that way, what aspects are "per instance" and what aspects are "per prototype", how to change which prototype an instance uses vs. how to change the prototype to affect all instances

The scope could be "intermediate" users, so no footprint creation, scripting and other advanced topics yet. The format could be 5..10 minutes, which is longer than my 1..3 minute "single feature" videos but shorter than the 36 minutes "getting started" video. I think the 5..10 minutes time frame is enough to cover a feature and its neighborhood in a holistic fashoin, not getting lost in fine details but giving an overview that's a good starter so users can then go and search/ask for those fine details elsewhere.

If we could have such a series, we could reference them in an ordered list from the tutorial page, and it would provide a great few hours, modular watch that gets a "blank" user to intermediate level.

More advanced topics for later: multiple font support.