Wayne Stambaugh talks about Kicad’s past, present, and future 

Welcome to Tech Explorations Podcast episode 2.

In this episode, Peter Dalmaris talks with Wayne Stambaugh. Wayne has been a developer for the KiCad project for over 12 years and the lead project developer for the last 6 years. He’s an electronics engineer with over 30 years of experience in electronics design and software development. Wayne has done a little bit of everything during his career, including digital, analog, and embedded design, as well as embedded programming in assembly, C, and desktop programming in C, C++, and Python.

In this interview, Wayne takes us back in time to tell the story of KiCad’s early days, trials, and tribulations. Of course, we also discussed the future of KiCad. With CERN backing the project, as well as other organizations like WIT, which now employs Wayne full-time to work on KiCad as its leader, and thousands of people contributing donations, KiCad is expected to grow and become perhaps the best open-source PCB tool—if it isn’t already.

Wayne also spoke about his experience at the recent first KiCad conference, KiCon, and the future of KiCad. Tech Explorations was a proud sponsor of KiCon.

Peter: Wayne, good morning or good evening in your case. How are you?

Wayne: Hi, I’m fantastic. How about yourself, Peter?

Peter: Great. I had a hectic morning, as I mentioned earlier, with a few technical issues that caused a bit of stress, but everything is under control now, or at least I think so. But I’m very happy to have you on this podcast interview. I’m very excited to have you as the project leader of KiCad. As you know, KiCad is one of my favorite open-source applications. It really helped me as a maker to create things. That’s the motivation for why I wanted to have you on.

KiCad has changed a lot over the years. Recently, last week, there was the first KiCon or KiCad conference ever, which was a resounding success. We’ll talk about that later. How about we start with just a little bit of background? Tell us who you are, where you come from, and how you eventually became the KiCad project leader.

Wayne: Sure, it’s a long story, but I’ll try to keep it brief. I’m actually an electronics engineer by education and experience. I graduated in 1986, so it’s been a while. Over the years, I’ve worked in embedded systems, analog and digital design, and programming. I consider myself a jack of all trades, master of none kind of guy.

In 2006, I started contributing to KiCad. I wanted to give something back to the open-source community and wasn’t sure how to do that. I had been using open-source software regularly since around 2000, and I eventually found KiCad. I started contributing code back when it wasn’t even hosted on SourceForge. It was just downloading the source archive, building it, and sending it back to Jean-Pierre, who was the project’s creator.

Peter: KiCad back in 2006 must have been quite different from what it is today. What was your contribution like in the early days?

Wayne: It was rough, to say the least. I started using KiCad at work because I was with a startup, and we didn’t want to spend money on commercial tools. However, it quickly became clear that there were many issues. I started digging into the code, and it was an adventure. The comments and code were in French, so the first thing I did was translate everything to English. I spent a year or more just cleaning up and refactoring the code to make it more manageable.

Peter: Sounds like a lot of foundational work that set the stage for KiCad to grow. What was the team like back then?

Wayne: Back then, it was mostly Jean-Pierre and me. Jean-Pierre, or JP as we call him, created KiCad in 1992 for his students at a university in France. He was a one-man show for a long time, and by 2006, the codebase was quite messy. Dick Hollenbeck, the first project leader, convinced JP to make the code public on SourceForge. That’s when I got involved. The three of us made most of the decisions together back then.

Peter: The cleanup work you did must have been tough, but necessary to make the project more accessible to other contributors.

Wayne: Absolutely. It was a lot of unglamorous work, but it had to be done. Without that, KiCad couldn’t have grown the way it has. We had to get the codebase to a place where others could contribute.

Peter: How did the community evolve over the years? How did you start incorporating their feedback?

Wayne: The community has been great at testing, reporting bugs, and providing feedback. We have a lot of users who run nightly builds and help us catch issues early. Their feedback helps shape new features and drives decisions on what to focus on for future releases.

Peter: You’ve been leading the project for a while now. What’s it like making decisions for such a large open-source project?

Wayne: It’s a balancing act. I consider feedback from users, the capabilities of the development team, and what’s feasible. As the project leader, I have the final say, but it’s always a collaborative effort with the team. We have a great group of developers, which makes my job easier.

Peter: Speaking of the team, how has it grown since 2006?

Wayne: The team has expanded beyond just developers. We have contributors working on libraries, translations, documentation, and packaging for different platforms. Right now, there are around 10 to 12 lead developers and a few dozen contributors. In total, including the people working on libraries and translations, I’d say there are around 50 to 60 regular contributors.

Peter: That’s impressive. The KiCad community also had its first conference, KiCon, last week. How did that come about, and what was the motivation behind it?

Wayne: Chris Gammell was the driving force behind KiCon. After seeing the enthusiasm for KiCad at FOSDEM, he approached me about organizing a dedicated conference. It was his initiative, and he did most of the work. The conference was a huge success, with 220 attendees. We had to turn people away because it sold out.

Peter: It sounds like a great event. What kind of talks and presentations were there?

Wayne: There were technical talks, industry talks, and even maker talks. We had speakers from companies like System 76 and SnapEDA, and there were also fun projects, like the coffin badge that was designed with KiCad. The after-hours events were also a big hit.

Peter: I’m curious about your keynote at the conference. You talked about the future of KiCad. Can you give us a summary of what’s next?

Wayne: Sure. The big focus for KiCad 6 is updating the schematic and symbol library file formats. This will lay the foundation for many new features, like pin and gate swapping, and better schematic editor tools. We’re also working on improving the auto-router, adding complex pad shapes, and enhancing usability across the board.

Peter: It sounds like the future of KiCad is bright. When can users expect KiCad 6 to be available?

Wayne: We aim to release KiCad 6 within the next couple of years. Now that I’m working full-time on the project, we hope to speed up development.

Peter: What advice would you give to someone who’s considering contributing to KiCad?

Wayne: If someone wants to contribute, they can join our developer mailing list or go to Launchpad, where we host the source code. I always recommend starting small since KiCad’s codebase is quite large.

Peter: Lastly, why should someone choose KiCad over other PCB design tools?

Wayne: KiCad offers a strong community and the security of knowing that it will always remain open-source. Unlike some commercial tools, KiCad’s license won’t change. It’s also a great option for open hardware, as CERN supports it to ensure their designs are truly open.

Peter: Wayne, thank you so much for sharing your insights. It’s been a pleasure talking with you.

Wayne: Thank you, Peter. I appreciate the opportunity to be on your show.

This concludes episode 2 of the Tech Explorations Podcast. You can find links to resources and more information about Wayne and KiCad on our website, techexplorations.com. Be sure to subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, and we’ll see you next time!