JLC / LCSC force the 3rd party JLC Assembly Parts Catalog down. - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / general

author: sleemanj
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2022, 10:12:23 pm
content: Many of you who used JLC Assembly will be familiar with theexcellent3rd party parts cataloguehttps://yaqwsx.github.io/jlcparts/#/which was develpped by Jan MrázekThis catalogue/search interface wasvastlysuperior and made designing for JLC Assembly muchmuchfaster, easier and better all around.Unfortunately seems that JLC and LCSC have got their panties in a knot and shot themselves in the footQuote from: yaqwsx

author: langwadt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2022, 10:23:03 pm
content: "Please, do not try to fork the service and make it available again"wink wink nudge nudge

author: Cerebus
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2022, 11:00:32 pm
content: Well, that's particularly stupid of JLC/LCSC. One thing that has put me off trying JLC's assembly service is how bloody difficult it is to navigate the parts catalogue, its user interface is truly, deeply, shitily awful. Now, as it happens, I didn't know of yaqwsx's efforts. Had I know I might have had a crack at JLC's assembly service by now. With them forcing the service offline they've just harmed themselves and their customers.Bloody idiots.

author: sleemanj
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 08, 2022, 11:26:19 pm
content: Quote from: langwadt on March 08, 2022, 10:23:03 pmYeah, the trouble is that JLC/LCSC are likely to IP block access to anybody else trying. The problem is that the scraping activity get get the data of all the parts is intensive, so you're going to show up on the radar probably unless you spend a few months doing it, or implement a large distributed network to get the data, but you'd need to be careful not to just appear as a DDOS then.Quote from: Cerebus on March 08, 2022, 11:00:32 pmYes, this tool made it a breeze to find the right parts, in stock, at the right price, for your project, now it's maybe in the too-hard-to-be-bothered basket for me again.

author: Cerebus
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2022, 12:05:56 am
content: Quote from: sleemanj on March 08, 2022, 11:26:19 pmExactly how I've felt about it so far.It'd need a significant run of boards with enough parts on them before I even considered it. When the effort of sourcing parts, printing the stencil, doing manual pick and place, reflowing and cleaning is lower than the effort of preparing it to hand it off to a board house youknowthat there's something wrong about their process.

author: JLCPCB Official
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2022, 05:58:16 am
content: Quote from: sleemanj on March 08, 2022, 10:12:23 pmWe notice this is a very great catalogue, it is forced because of technical security configuration. We will discuss some ways to use it. As long as it is good for ""faster, easier and better" PCB/PCBA service, we are all welcome and willing to try. We are very happy to see everyone's feedback on the forum, feel free to share more good ideas on JLCPCB's service.

author: retiredfeline
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2022, 07:10:33 am
content: Quote from: JLCPCB Official on March 09, 2022, 05:58:16 amMate, hire the yaqwsx dude to do a catalogue website for you. It'll be a win-win!

author: langwadt
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 09, 2022, 12:23:49 pm
content: Quote from: JLCPCB Official on March 09, 2022, 05:58:16 amtalk to the guy about how to make the data needed for the tool available in some way that doesn't involve scraping the website, you already have parts table available as a .csv file

author: Kean
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 09, 2022, 07:46:32 pm
content: Quote from: JLCPCB Official on March 09, 2022, 05:58:16 amMaybe you can host a version of his improved catalog on your own website?The code is available for you to review and customize to suit your "security" needs.https://github.com/yaqwsx/jlcparts

author: phil from seattle
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: March 11, 2022, 04:18:31 am
content: I used this a lot. Especially when parts shortages force a redesign - for example, changing the package of an out of stock part. It was an incredibly useful.To JLCPCB: Please figure out a way to let it work. This tool helped me to order more services from you. It increases customer lock-in. Why wouldn't you want it to exist?

author: Kean
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: March 11, 2022, 04:35:55 am
content: @JLCPCB Official Also you should consider making a donation to Jan - all he ever wanted to do was help your customershttps://ko-fi.com/yaqwsx

author: JLCPCB Official
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 11, 2022, 08:42:05 am
content: We are discussing with LCSC, our brother company, about resuming it, please give us some time and wait.

author: JLCPCB Official
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 11, 2022, 09:11:04 am
content: Quote from: Kean on March 11, 2022, 04:35:55 amdone!https://Ko-fi.com/home/coffeeshop?txid=0b4cae64-e68c-4b13-89cf-a4e7820e70bc&mode=public&img=ogiboughtsomeone

author: nvmR
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: March 11, 2022, 09:57:50 am
content: JLC, make things right. Without this tool, we spend more time to make each board = less boards we have time to make.

author: ebastler
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 19, 2022, 10:37:21 am
content: It seems that JLCPCB have done it again... According to the notice onhttps://yaqwsx.github.io/jlcparts/#/, they blocked the provision of catalog data to Jan's and other services.I don't get this. JLCPCB's own online catalog continues to be such a mess:Parts are outright missing from their selection -- but if you find a part number on LCSC and enter it directly at JLCPCB, the part might well be available as an extended part;options are missing from the filter lists -- e.g. a certain package size is not available in the filter list at all, although eventually you find a part which is correctly annotated with just that package option;filter lists allow only a single selection at a time -- no chance to select e.g. a range of power ratings or supply voltages, or the three different names they use for the same package;filter lists for values are inalphabetical order, for Pete's sake! So 1 kOhm is right next to 1 MOhm. But 1.5 kOhm is somewhere else entirely...JLCPCB would do themselves a huge favor by actively supporting 3rd party catalogs. They would do themselves an even bigger favor by letting customers use the LCSC catalog, which gets all of the above right. Just add "JLCPCB part" and "JLCPCB basic part" checkboxes to the LCSC parts search, and one would have a workable solution.

author: Nogtail
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: December 19, 2022, 11:48:12 pm
content: I'm not sure how JLCPCB has managed to make such an awful interface for component selection. It's borderline unusable without third party tools. Just the other day I was trying to find a polyfuse on their abomination of a website. The search box is worse than useless so I tried to find the correct category. Surely I'd find what I'm looking for in "Fuses > Ptc Resettable Fuses" right? NOPE! That only has 11 items. How about "Circuit Protection > Resettable Fuses"? That'd be the right place surely? WRONG! 4 items. Turns out they're actually in "tvs/fuse/board Level Protection > Resettable Fuses". Even clicking the right category is a challenge when hovering over anything causes it to expand and shift everything down. With yaqwsx's tool I can just CTRL+F for "fuse", select those categories then parametrically search the results.

author: sleemanj
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 20, 2022, 02:26:36 am
content: Ugh. JLC and LCSC really are bone-headed.They have this guy, for free, providing a vastly better tool, which makes their service better and easier to use, at no cost to JLC/LCSC, they don't even expend bandwidth on it since the processed data is all stored in the gh pages, and what do they do, shut it down.I can't understand such a decision at all, it makes no sense, absolutely no sense what-so-ever.

author: NorthGuy
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: December 20, 2022, 05:13:32 pm
content: Quote from: sleemanj on December 20, 2022, 02:26:36 amThey may be protecting themselves from re-sellers.