My awesome macropad!

Devlog #8
Did more of the PCB. I realised that I didn’t put the correct footprint library for the LED thats why it didn’t appear so I corrected it and fixed it up in the schematic. I made my shape rounded in the corner and did some wiring. I think doing the wiring is like solving a puzzle cause I have to make it connect but sometimes my other wires block the way. In the next session, I’ll have to continue wiring. I stopped because I was strugglying to find the area I can connect them. Should probably redraw some wires next time too.

Devlog #7
I did the layout of my pcb! I’m not entirely sure of the exact mm measurements for the oled so I just did a rough rectangle. This follows my plan that I drew earlier

Devlog #6
I finished the schematic for my hackpad! I think I figured out how the labeling works. You still use wires but instead of all the wires going to one place you need, the labels kind of mean the same thing as that place and you can connect the label and the location you want with the wires, making it less messy. I did a couple of mistakes where I thought I could just just all the wires to one label but when I searched it up, it turns out it kind of messes things up so new thing learnt. I also did a bit of pcb thing and I thought I worked all the correct measurements but for some reason the rotary switch didn’t align with my SW5 which made me utterly confused. Funny, I spent like 20 mins trying to work out how to make it accurate but idk if I even did it correctly cause I was unsure on how to use the measurement tool. Next session I’m gonna continue my pcb board and hopefully can get all the measurement!

Devlog #5
So I thought I found a very easy way to connect things as it gets really messy and hard to read with a lot of wires but it turns out I did not understand how to do it at all lol. As you can tell, I used both labels and wires to do as I thought the labels just are there as naming but oops turns out I was completely wrong. I think I might just stick to plain wires for the future.

Devlog #4
So honestly I didn’t do it for a day because I got lost on what to do when the tutorial ended. In this session I spent like half an hour doing research in which I made a small design plan with the components I want to add and a drawing of my expected outcome for the hackpad. I also added all the new components in the schematic. I just need to wire them now. I learnt a trick where wiring starts to get really confusing and messy when there is a lot so we can use labels to make things neater. In the next session I plan to finish up the schematic and move on to the pcb!

Devlog #3
This was really confusing. So I made the usb port slot and the lid where the keys will be and then the tutorial just ended. The dxf I imported in wouldn’t connect with the other part of the top case when using boolean so I had to slightly increase the size in which I hope doesn’t affect. I know I’m suppose to make it my own now but I am really lost on what to do. Like I genuiely have no idea had the stuff connects or works as I am a complete beginner. I think next session I’ll idk try to watch some tutorials and understand this more. I really hope the hackpad tutorial would go into more further detail though becuase I thought this was beginner friendly 😭

Devlog #2
This was a real pain to do. In the tutorial, it said to use to Fusion360 which I decided to try out for the first time but it was really confusing and hard to understand. The tutorials I searched up were also very limited for the parts I couldn’t get. Like for example, I needed the exact measurement but the dimensions wouldn’t appear for me to change. I only found out how to do it after searching in the comments which was to press D. So well… I kind of gave up and went back to Onshape. I created a bit of the case and the holes. I think in the next session, I might learn how to transfer the Onshape case to Fusion360 as it seems I need to put in some data from the tutorial. I’ll try my best to learn how to use FUsion360!

Devlog #1
Following the Hackpad guide, I made my schematic and some of the PCB parts in Kicad. This was my first time using Kicad.