Fritzing + images ?

Posted by: @zeferby

So my question is : do you know if there is there a way to add some kind of graphics to the "breadboard view"  in Fritzing ?

Short answer - no, I'm afraid that I don't. 

Other answer - export your Fritzing breadboard to an image and then use your favorite graphics editor to add your images. Of course, they won't be part of your schematic or board layout.

Fritzing does have a Parts Editor, and you are supposed to be able to create your own parts. But the documentation is scarce and what does exist is not entirely accurate in my experience.  I gave up trying years ago.

Personally I think that Fritzing is an abandoned project, it hasn't been updated for over three years and it never made it to version 1.0. Which is really sad as it had a lot of potential.

For schematics, I've been using Scheme-It. It's by no means perfect and has its share of frustrating features (like if you delete one ground it deletes them all), but it is free and it does have a parts editor that accepts image files.

?

Bill

Thanks Bill that confirms what I thought...I was only hoping I missed something...

And thanks for the link, I'll give a try at Scheme-It tomorrow !

I speak from the consumer perspective in this area, and enjoy following designs produced by others, illustrated using Fritzing or other similar tools. I have used Eagle CAD in a class, where we all learned several things, followed the teacher in trying to design and lay out our circuit. In the end, of course, he used his own files for submission for the actual PCBs, 25 copies.

I saw an interesting chapter in a multipart article by Brian Benchoff where he evaluated several popular tools for several criteria, but most critically for actually producing a PCB. He concluded Fritzing was for documenting circuits, as in for publication or teaching, but nothing else. The article is:

CREATING A PCB IN EVERYTHING: FRIENDS DON’T LET FRIENDS USE FRITZING

I'm already out of my depth so I'll stop now 😯  But good luck on your diagrams! I look forward to seeing that post. John

@jbo

I have Fritzing on my PC but never got around to using it. I see it is being supported as v0.97 is out and I have v 0.94 on my pc. I bought some plans where the author used Fritzing and the images of the Arduino were blurry as he enlarged them without first using a good tool to save the resolution (Gigapixel AI). I like Sprint Layout and Diptrace but have also used DesignSpark PCB (Free) to make circuits and even had some boards professionally made. But as always, too many irons in the fire. 😮 I may buy the latest Fritzing though as it's only $10 and they have removed many bugs.

@ZeFerby You can download the Fritzing parts from their official website or from any other third party website. Just Google search it and you'll get it. The .fzz file is what you need and not png or jpeg. 

Then fire up Fritzing and click on Import parts. Then browse to the Downloads folder of your PC and select the .fzz file of that component. It will be imported in the schematic/breadboard diagram. 

Hope this helps. 🙂 

@sumanta Thanks.

Actually because of Covid + new house, I had to ditch all my electronics stuff in cardboard boxes more than ayear ago.  I'm only now hoping to clear/equip enough space with insulation, power and heating to re-create a mini workshop again 🙂

Posted by: @zeferby

Thanks

@zeferby Glad to help you. 

Posted by: @zeferby

Actually because of Covid + new house, I had to ditch all my electronics stuff in cardboard boxes more than ayear ago.  I'm only now hoping to clear/equip enough space with insulation, power and heating to re-create a mini workshop again

Best of luck for the recreation of your workshop. 👍 

Posted by: @zeferby

do you know if there is there a way to add some kind of graphics to the "breadboard view"  in Fritzing ?

Maybe this will help.  put a part in breadboard view and rightclick on the part and select "Edit (new parts editor)".

In that screen you can 'file' 'load image for view' .

But in the image is stored layers with connection points that I don't understand.

Myron

One other thing is that I try to search for part files with the fritzing file extension " fzpz"

then import those part files.  i.e. https://duckduckgo.com/?q=PCA9685+fzpz

Some parts are more complete than others.

@Myron

I am really just starting with Fritzing but I found this to be a good beginner tutorial.

Hey, I saw a similar post like this in fritzing's forum.

Maybe this will help you.

https://forum.fritzing.org/t/newbie-question-about-how-to-add-components/13503