Editing Incubator escapee wiki:Modular electronics schematics (section)

== Discussion ==
I like this idea. There was an electronic experiment set made by the Japanese company Gakken (&#23398;&#30740;) in the late 1970s that used this idea. That toy was a board with dozens of bricks each contains a electronic component (resistor, transistor, capicitor ...) with metal pins on two or more sides of the brick. When you insert the bricks to the board it forms a working circuit. The board contains batteries and an IC amplifier. That toy was fun. -- [[User:Toytoy|Toytoy]] 03:35, Mar 2, 2005 (UTC)

: The Gakken toy: http://www.ipv6style.jp/jp/apps/20031029/images/1.jpg . This set has been modified. You can see 7 original dark green bricks on top (jump wires, switch, jump wires and a diode). For more information: http://www.ipv6style.jp/en/apps/20031029/index.shtml . A patent lasts only 17 years then, so we can safely implement it on the Internet. -- [[User:Toytoy|Toytoy]] 03:42, Mar 2, 2005 (UTC)

:: They are still selling it! http://shop.gakken.co.jp/otonanokagaku/block.html Using bricks to create simple circuit diagrams is really a great idea. I suggest that we imitate the design of Gakken. -- [[User:Toytoy|Toytoy]] 03:47, Mar 2, 2005 (UTC)

:::This is to make schematic diagrams, not block toys.  The blocks already exist; we just have to decide if we want to use them. - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]] 04:16, Mar 2, 2005 (UTC)

Hey this is pretty cool. I saw this same concept earlier on [[Template:Football kit]]. This would be very useful for making simple circuits that don't warrant the effort of making an actual diagram. &mdash;[[User:Jleedev|Josh Lee]] 01:52, Mar 6, 2005 (UTC)

:On the other hand, there are currently about 300 images that would need to be uploaded (and renamed consistently).  :-)  Not exactly simple.  So we should do it only if it will be worth it. - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]] 05:44, Mar 6, 2005 (UTC)

I think we need to come up with some solution for schematics. This one is probably easier to implement than a full blown SVG rendering engine. It's also readily extensible. There are too many cases where I've been too lazy to create a schematic. I would definitely use it if it was available and it's not too painful. We can collaborate on naming... [[User:Msiddalingaiah|Madhu]] 20:06, 6 Mar 2005 (UTC)

:Check out [[Wikipedia:Modular electronics diagrams]] for my current naming scheme idea. 
:If we ported the editor it would not be painful, but typing in tables by hand sort of is. - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]] 20:56, Mar 6, 2005 (UTC)

I agree that we need to come up with a way to make editable schematics.  On some of my pages I tried to upload the .dia source to the images, but Dia sucks in a lot of ways.  Then Wikipedia stopped letting me do these uploads.  I was going to object that this Klunky tool would generate really bulky schematics, with little to no ability to name components.... but then I saw your examples.  They're pretty good!  I'm amazed you can do things like surround portions of the design with colored boxes.

: '''You can't.'''  Everything I've made up until now is screenshots that I manipulated afterwards.  Only the three examples above use the new idea.  We could probably use table borders to do something similar with the modular ones, though. - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]]

I would still prefer something like an SVG renderer in Wikipedia.  Many technical things require line drawings that are not circuit diagrams.  I wonder how many Wikipedia pages would actually be helped by this tool.  Also, this Klunky tool would need some standardized way to add to the tile set.  If I don't have the font you used, or if my drawing tool antialiases a different way, how do I make my tiles compatible with yours?

:Yes, SVG rendering with electronic component templates would definitely be better.
:This method uses whatever font is in your browser.  All text is editable by anyone.  No antialiasing to worry about.  We are just taking pre-made images and putting them in a table.  (And making new ones when we need something that doesn't already exist.) - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]]

:But it looks like [[m:SVG image support|SVG image support]] is in the far-off future, though... - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]] 02:31, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)

But it looks cool.  Do you even need Wikipedia to change anything to use it?  It would appear you could just take the table Klunky generates and drop it into a wikipedia page.  Maybe stick a note on it telling later editors how to stuff it back into Klunky for editing.
[[User:Iain.mcclatchie|Iain McClatchie]] 08:22, 7 Mar 2005 (UTC)

:Yes, we would just have to upload the images according to a standardized naming scheme (see above) and start making tables.  An intuitive editor would be nicer, but maybe we could make the klunky program into a wikicode outputter, so you could download it only if you want and then copy and paste?  This would also fit in well with a [[Wikipedia:Proposal_for_intuitive_table_editor_and_namespace|separate table namespace]]. - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]] 23:36, Mar 7, 2005 (UTC)

Not bad, but the image components need to be transparent. [[User:Dysprosia|Dysprosia]] 04:04, 9 Mar 2005 (UTC)

:Yeah.  Good point.  I've noticed diagrams with transparent backgrounds look bad in frames, though. - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]] 04:50, Mar 9, 2005 (UTC)

I have never used Klunky but the diagrams [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Omegatron/Gallery] look good, especially the one for the 741 op amp with the colour dotted rectangles. So Klunky would get my vote, just so long as it does not become mandatory on Wiki and other graphics progs can still be used. One fear about Klunky, being block oriented, is lack of flexibilty which can make it difficult to keep schematics in 'data flow'.  Some graphics packages like Word Draw, Visio and AutoCad (lite) give more flexibility and resolution which is useful, for example when you need circuit symbols and general drawing on the same image. Also, there are many archive schematics around in Protel and it is good for doing complex circuits. - [[User:CPES|CPES]] 21:56, 10 Mar 2005 (UTC)

:Well my diagrams so far are 90% klunky and 10% post-processing.  The "coloured" dotted rectangles were added in afterwards, for instance.  The schematic drawing packages are fine also for making "rasterized" images, but this is about uploading each block individually so we can edit them on the fly from within wikipedia. - [[User:Omegatron|Omegatron]] 02:31, Mar 11, 2005 (UTC)