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Prepare Component Position File

Generate Placement Files in KiCad​

Export component positions from the KiCad PCB editor

Open the Bus Pirate 5 project file in KiCad and open the PCB in the PCB editor.

In the PCB editor choose File > Fabrication Outputs > Component Placement (.pos)

Save .pos files to ASCII format​

Setting for position file export

Export in ASCII format and millimeters. Export seperate files for each side of the PCB, we'll just pick and place one side.

Click Generate Position File. -top.pos and -bottom.pos will be created and saved to the /gerber folder of the project.

Convert to Neoden format .csv​

Convert the position file to Neoden format using kicad_to_neoden.py from the command line

Copy the kicad_to_neoden.py script to the /gerber folder containing the .pos files.

From a command prompt run kicad_to_neoden.py {name of position file} to convert the KiCad .pos files to Neoden friendly .csv format.

Check the conversion​

Open the converted file in a text editor to see the changes

Open the new .csv file in a text editor to see the output.

According to the KiCad-to-Neoden project page, the script makes the following changes to the data:

  • Filters out all lines beginning with a hash (#)
  • Converts 0-359 rotation value into -180 to +180 value
  • Truncates measurements to two decimal places and adds "mm"
  • Converts "top" to "T" and everything else to "B" (this could be a gotcha if there is anything other than "bottom" output by KiCad)
  • Orders output for NeoDen to "Designator,Footprint,Mid X,Mid Y,Layer,Rotation,Comment"