I just put together this kit, and can definitely say that I am not in favor of the “ginorma jumpers”! Something like this should have the jumpers cut to size, to better match the tutorial and the layout. I thought there would be more space to do my own thing on the breadboard, and there is very little, however if the jumpers were the right size it would be much easier to see what is there vs what isnt.
I also found the following “annoyances”:
There weren’t enough red/black jumpers. those are the 2 main colors you want to know (where the power is).
The headers need to be tweaked to be usable. At least note it in the instructions. If I tried to put the short side in the breadboard it would pop out. But if I used the long side in the breadboard the FTDI board had trouble keeping it’s connection. I had to move the plastic in the jump to the middle, and that worked better.
The layout was very frustrating to use on the breadboard. This might be my imagination, but it really appeared that even if I got one side of the layout right, the holes were off on the other side. I would recommend either creating a way to get the layout on the board better, or just create a larger layout not designed to be on the board, and more readable.
Anyway thanks for putting together this thing. Maybe I’ll find a bunch of solid wire somewhere and re-do the wiring. It would help oh so much.