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Layers
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Hol' up, im still working the kinks out of linux. I am realizing the real distinction these days has more to do with flatpak vs source vs appimage. Better linux instructions coming up
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# Layers
A Photoshop-style logical-layer panel for KiCad 10. Group items into named logical layers,
hide them as a unit, rename/colour/lock/annotate, run set ops (merge/subtract/intersect),
snap to grid, snapshot and restore — all live against an open `pcbnew` session over KiCad's
IPC API.
An image maniplulation program-style logical-layer panel for KiCad 10. Adds a overlay-style panel (in the spirit of Paint DOT net) into named logical layers.
You can add or subtract your selection to and from the layer, or to and from the board. You can hide and unhide each layers cleanly. You can rename/colour/lock/annotate, sort and organize the layers, a layer can have childen.
There are also boolean operations (merge/subtract/intersect) between layers (logical)
snap to grid, and more to come. Operations are all composed together as one commit and can easily be undone with Edit->Undo or equivalent.
Rendering of in-panel board previews is powered by [Siphon](https://git.else-if.org/jess/Siphon),
a pure-Rust KiCad-board-to-vectors crate. No shell-outs, no `kicad-cli`.
a pure-Rust KiCad-board-to-vectors crate. You would not technically need KiCad installed to produce the vectors, it is a completely isolated utility which makes no calls at all to kicad-cli.
## Install
Every platform installs into KiCad 10's 3rd-party plugin directory. After install, open
KiCad's **Plugin and Content Manager** and rescan, or relaunch KiCad; the Layers toolbar
button appears in `pcbnew`.
Every platform installs into KiCad 10's *10.0/plugin* directory. I'm 90% sure that's where they are supposed to go.
Close KiCad completely prior to running the install script or KiCad might crash, and you might lose work. Close KiCad completely when you update the plugin too. Turns out there's a lot of differences between python and Rust plugins, though maybe the better distiction is IPC plugins in general. I am yet to make a python IPC plugin though, so I can't say for certain.
### macOS
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### Windows (10 / 11, ARM64 or x86_64)
A single native Rust binary — no .NET, no WinUI, no Visual Studio. Mica backdrop
on Windows 11 22H2+ via `DwmSetWindowAttribute`, falls back gracefully on older
Windows. Both ARM64 and x86_64 hosts work the same way.
Grrr. It works. I'm still too tickled to talk about it. It did some real spiteful shit to me. I refused to install visual studio on my VM, and it never forgave me for that.
#### 1. Install MSYS2
@ -114,8 +113,6 @@ install.bat
Installs to `%USERPROFILE%\Documents\KiCad\10.0\plugins\com.jesshunter.layers\`
(or the OneDrive-redirected equivalent).
No external runtime required — the exe is statically linked against the MSYS2
clangarm64 / ucrt64 toolchain. Just ship the folder.
### Linux — Debian / Ubuntu / Pop!_OS (apt)
@ -134,7 +131,7 @@ cd Layers
./scripts/install-linux.sh
```
Installs to `~/.local/share/kicad/10.0/3rdparty/plugins/com.jesshunter.layers/`.
Installs to `~/.local/share/kicad/10.0/plugins/com.jesshunter.layers/`.
### Linux — Arch / Manjaro (pacman)
@ -152,7 +149,7 @@ cd Layers
./scripts/install-linux.sh
```
Installs to `~/.local/share/kicad/10.0/3rdparty/plugins/com.jesshunter.layers/`.
Installs to `~/.local/share/kicad/10.0/plugins/com.jesshunter.layers/`.
## Configuration