[Ktechlab-devel] Some feature ideas

[Link]

Here are some ideas for features that I had, that you may or may not be 
interested in. I thought I'd let you know anyway :).

1. Field lines indicating the magnetic flux around inductors. Similar to 
the animated wires indicating current flow, animated field lines could 
show the changing magnetic fields around inductors.

2. Tooltips on components. For example, a capacitor's tooltip could show 
the charge stored on it, and a resistive component could show the power 
it dissipates.

3. A "discharge all" feature that simply resets every wire to 0V, 0A. 
When changing circuits while some components are still powered (by a 
supply, or because some capacitors/inductors still have energy stored), 
you often get weird results. A "discharge" button would eliminate these 
problems.

4. A "show power pins" option on opamps similar to the "show body pin" 
on MOSFETs. Using the power pins, one could select the minimum and 
maximum values of an opamp's output.

5. Hidden wires or net ports. When you have more than a handful of 
components, it can get extremely tricky to see different wires. A simple 
solution would be "net ports" like gEDA's gschem has. Place a net port 
on one pin, and another with the same identifier on another, and the 
pins act as if they're connected by a wire, though none is drawn.

6. Transformers/mutual inductors, Zeners, regulators and other 
components commonly found in real-life circuits that KTL lacks. Big one, 
I know, but it would make KTechlab a lot better!

7. Enhanced potentiometers: log/antilog pots, and the ability to set the 
fader position as a percentage in the properties window.

8. Overload indicators: if a component is subject to more 
voltage/current/power than it is supposed to handle, it could display a 
warning signal, informing the user to change the parameters or supplies. 
This also involves addition of polar capacitors, capacitor voltage 
ratings, resistor wattage ratings, and so on, but those values need not 
be used by the actual simulator (i.e. a .25W resistor dissipating 1W 
would still work, but would display a warning sign, as would a polar 
capacitor that's reverse-biased), so it shouldn't be /that/ difficult to 
implement.

Good luck with the project, and thanks for making KTL!