How do you plan out your electronics?

colporteur  YES!!!  That's exactly how it goes! 

I loved your list and then thought of making annoying additions

• Get idea
• have sleepless nights about idea
• discuss idea with significant other about idea
• have to explain why idea good or accept being ignored.
• have more sleepless night thinking about idea
• discuss idea with technical buddies
• have conflicting suggestions
• have to justify the reason for implementing the idea
• accept it might be a bad idea but want to do it anyway.
• make drawing of idea

...

I'm fascinated by how people approach technical projects. Mine always start with the idea becoming a drawing. If it becomes a drawing there is a very strong possibility it will get developed. I have spent weeks on the drawings alone. Without the drawing it's not tangible in my mind. Examining the drawing forces me to ask questions. I rather have the questions and possible answer before starting than later finding out, awe shite, why didn't I think of that. 

Ohhh, that. Ofcourse! Makes sense. ^_^

I never use that..

- First draw diagram,

- Breadboard the idea.

- Debug the result.

- Build on PCB.

I've never had much use for the breadboard coordinate system. I always figured it's used for educational purposes in which (Fritzing-like) drawings and instructions reference to it...

> 'I note down the reference on breadboard',

Most breadboards I've seen have a grid reference, numbers and letters, along the top/side, so that you could note them down and recreate the layout.

I'm not completely sure with what you mean by 'I note down the reference on breadboard', but over the decennia I learned to Always(!) draw diagrams.

A failure to plan is planning to fail. These days I honestly I don't care if "It's only an I/O pin, a switch and a resistor, what could go wrong?" Well I have stories!

Put principle and design on paper (I don't care what kind of paper and what you use as pen. Just get it 'not in your head only') Breadboard the idea. Find out where you messed up and fix + update designs from there.

Then, if you Really want to PCB it, PCB it.

Thing is also: If you've done some work on it, and it shows under other stuff, and you look at it a month later, your ideas and knowledge about it is gone.

Plus, and this is important: The 'design phase' is often the most pleasurable one if you do it in the garden, under a tree in the shade, enjoying a glass of your poison / soda of choice, optionally stopping and lighting a pipe or something. ^_^

I get my best ideas not sitting at a computer.

I usually start with researching what’s possible and sketch something, take notes and so on, but quickly move to Kicad to draw it up which I tend to annotate with part numbers and data sheet links so I can quickly refer back.  I’m continually writing stuff up in my notebook though. 

For some things I will create simulations in LTSpice but I’m not that great with that tool so I can never tell if what I’m seeing is likely to be right or not! 

If I can breadboard something first I will but I’ve decided that it’s as easy to get a PCB made - I’ve just had 5 pieces of a 100mmx100mm 4 layer PCB delivered, with a stencil for less than £25, which is comparable to buying a small number of DIL adapters for the SMD chips.  2-layer, no stencil is about half that price.  If breadboarding with SMD required getting hold of DIL adapters I don’t think I’ll bother in future.  Hobbyist timelines make this ok as there is always something else to be getting on with or reading about.

For me, there is no one answer to that question but it’s good to hear how others do it

Projects start with a drawing.

I wouldn't say proper electronic drawing, if you mean engineering drawing. The napkin scribbles go into a graphics program. At work it was Visio but retirement has afforded me the learning of Inkscape. I have used Eagle and Fritzing but initial drawings usually Inkscape.

I'm a visual learner. After I discovered this about myself I invested in it. You name it concepts, functional or visions all went into a drawings.

The technique I practised all throughout my career was to start with a drawing for the project and then ensure that it is updated with changes and distributed. All versions held in a repository.

cstanton  Nicely done one bone to pick with this  How do you plan out your electronics? In one of the questions should have been Wire-Wrap!!! So I pick Soldered, but non of the questions did justice to what I do.

1. I need to layout my requirements.
2. I check the pinouts of all the chips and run the logic with a block diagram.
3. I might draw a schematic, Fritzing is pitiful. There are better e-CAD programs out there for FREE.
4. I wire left to right, and top down.
5. test, test, test, to make life easier you can use #ifdef, #else, and #endif please refer to Adventures into CANaerospace part 2
6. Last thing write modular code.

~~Cris H

Paper and pen. As an example, this was the plan of a layout [bird's nest style, not pcb] for Frank's op amp that I showed in the comments to his blog here Op-amp made from Discrete Components

shabaz You have restored my faith in humanity.   I was thinking about your PlanetCatcher when I answered "Wing it" and just how for on the other side of the spectrum I am on my projects.

I like the stool.  People will learn to just spin it around so the hinge is in the rear.  Problem solved.  Or drink two beers and they won't care.