Show HN: A spacecraft block diagram editor

  • Posted 3 hours ago by thadjones
  • 2 points
https://satblocks.com
I work on early stage spacecraft concepts, so I draft and edit spacecraft block diagrams often. Each and every time I'm frustrated by the "fiddliness" of tools like Powerpoint or Visio - lines overlap when I don't want them to, or don't when I do. I fight invisible grids when sizing and placing boxes. Legend entries end up ever-so-slightly misaligned. So I made my own little single-purpose tool.

Satblocks is the distillation of my own opinionated set of spacecraft block diagram requirements and needs into a niche tool. I actually had developed it in the framework of a larger early spacecraft development toolkit I've been building called Vesper[1] but I was so pleased with how charmingly effective it was, I decided to break it out as a standalone tool as well.

I'm not sure if it will be useful to anyone else, but for me it has been a wonderful small upgrade in building what can be tedious and fiddly system artifacts. Try it out!

[1] https://vesperastro.com

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