Reduce kicad installer size or Install library data separately
Would it be usefull to split the installer into separate packages for the software and the libraries?
For users, that use their own libraries, they could just install the software package and don't need to download all the libraries and data sheets.
With separate packages it would also be easily possible to install the libraries to a different location on the harddisk (outside of C:\Program Files\...).
Blueprint information
- Status:
- Complete
- Approver:
- None
- Priority:
- Undefined
- Drafter:
- None
- Direction:
- Needs approval
- Assignee:
- None
- Definition:
- Discussion
- Series goal:
- None
- Implementation:
-
Implemented
- Milestone target:
- None
- Started by
- Wayne Stambaugh
- Completed by
- Wayne Stambaugh
Related branches
Related bugs
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The main goal is to reduce the size of the installer for kicad
After looking at the share folder I think there are two areas to be addressed:
1. Install module libraries separately from kicad core software
2. Reduce the amount of never-used files from both packages.
Kicad comes with a lot of extra files that people most probably will never use. This makes the installer a bit more bloated than it needs to be.
The main culprit is PDF's in the library area. 90Mb could be trimmed from the installer by removing these. Probably links to the original manufacturers PDF should be used instead of distributing them. This way we avoid distributing out-of-date documents accidentally.
A secondary space hog is source files being distributed with the end-user files.
kicad/doc/
A third area for size reduction is the 3d packages. We should check to see if the wrl loader can handle compressed files and compress them if it can.
== Consensus tally ==
(Liberally paraphrased from mailing list)
-In favor of removal-
Hauptmech - Remove datasheets and extra ODT files.
Dick - Datasheets not used, URL to site is better
Fabrizio - Doesn't use datasheets but supports them remaining. ODT files can go
Simon Turner - Removal of datasheets and odt a good idea.
-In favor of keeping-
JeanPierre - Datasheets useful part of docs. ODT files useful part of docs
Karl Schmidt - Datasheets needed because he can't find originals occasionally. URL is not a replacement for datasheet. URL to manufacturers website is good.
