API Reference

Primary API docs live on docs.rs:

• kicad-ipc-rs API Reference

Key items:

• KiCadClient (async)
• KiCadClientBlocking (blocking feature)
• KiCadError
• Typed models under model::*

PCB item API layers:

• Raw IPC: *_raw methods return prost_types::Any payloads for direct protobuf interop.
• Read model: PcbItem and related Pcb* structs are lightweight decoded models for inspection.
• Editable model: EditablePcbItem and typed wrappers preserve the full protobuf payload for mutate/update workflows.

Raw command escape hatch:

• KiCadClient::send_raw_command(...)
• KiCadClientBlocking::send_raw_command(...) (blocking feature)

Use this when KiCad exposes a protobuf command that does not yet have a typed helper.

Editable item helpers:

• get_editable_items_by_id(...)
• get_editable_items_by_type_codes(...)
• create_editable_items(...)
• update_editable_items(...)

Use EditablePcbItem when you need to fetch existing board items, mutate fields like layer or position, and write them back through KiCad IPC without hand-building protobuf Any payloads. The editable wrappers expose proto(), proto_mut(), and into_proto() as advanced escape hatches when typed helpers are not enough.

Typed board text helpers:

• create_board_text(...)
• create_board_texts(...)
• create_board_text_in_container(...)
• create_board_texts_in_container(...)

These helpers build kiapi.board.types.BoardText payloads and send typed CreateItems, matching kicad-python’s direct BoardText creation path. Prefer them for silkscreen and board text creation instead of parse_and_create_items_from_string(...).

All-PCB item reads:

• get_all_pcb_items_raw(...)
• get_all_pcb_items_details(...)
• get_all_pcb_items(...)

These methods use one combined GetItems request for the known PCB object classes, then bucket returned payloads by KiCad item type. If KiCad returns a payload type the crate cannot map, the call returns KiCadError::InvalidResponse instead of silently dropping it.

Deletion notes:

• delete_items(...) returns ids reported by KiCad as deleted.
• KiCad 10.0.x may acknowledge DeleteItems with no per-item rows. In that case delete_items(...) returns the requested ids after request success; treat them as accepted by KiCad, not independently verified deleted.

Object and layer lookup helpers:

• PcbObjectTypeCode::from_name(...) accepts proto names and friendly names like trace, track, footprint, pad, text, and silkscreen-text.
• PcbObjectTypeCode::new_trace(), new_pad(), new_text(), and related constructors avoid hardcoded object type numbers.
• BoardLayerInfo::id_from_name(...) and canonical_name_for_id(...) resolve KiCad board layer names such as F.SilkS and protobuf names such as BL_F_SilkS.

Selection API notes:

• get_selection_* methods now take type_codes: Vec<i32> (Vec::new() means no filter).
• add_to_selection, remove_from_selection, clear_selection return SelectionMutationResult (decoded items + summary).
• get_selection_as_string returns SelectionStringDump (ids + contents).

Net query notes (KiCad 10.0.1):

• get_items_by_net(...) treats net names as authoritative.
• Numeric net codes are carried for legacy compatibility but should not be used as the primary dedupe key.

Breaking-change note (unreleased):

• TitleBlockInfo.comments now preserves fixed comment1..comment9 slot ordering (including internal empty slots) when round-tripping through set_title_block_info and get_title_block_info.
• For this pre-1.0 crate, expect this behavior change to land in a new minor release (not a patch release).