Comment by rkagerer
11 hours ago
With the ability to change one number and regenerate everything
That's exactly how I use Solidworks (and similar parametric CAD software) all the time. It takes some discipline, but the key is for all your geometry and relations to be driven from sketches and equations. Then you just change a value (sketch dimension or global constant), hit rebuild, and everything regenerates fairly reliably.
Don't get me wrong, this is a great project and I love seeing efforts like this, OpenSCAD, etc. add more options in the landscape of parametric CAD.
But I do find the graphical interface very natural for doing creative design work. In fact, sometimes I wish I could literally step into my design in VR and grab and move vertices around in 3 dimensions (eg. when fine tuning non-planar splines).
"I do find the graphical interface very natural for doing creative design work"
As do I!
I don't think there is any correct single answer. People, their workflows, and requirements are different.
It seems we are living in CAD renaissance which is great! So many new promising new companies and free tools popping up.
Personally I would prioritize data stability and visual accessibility. These give user a creative workspace that is intuitive and forgiving. That's why I started doing my own modeler as a side project:
https://github.com/AdaShape/adashape-open-testing/releases/t...
The data model is fully immutable and would enable doing _proper_ model branching when I get there. For now all the user gets is a super robust undo and not needing to save (the model is streamed to disk persistently).
But eventually I would like it to be a visual, robust workbench where you can iterate fast, save versions when feel like it, etc.
(I worked for a decade on various CAD offerings at Trimble including SketchUp so know fairly well what I'm doing but it's still super early)
I'm with you. What I've learned from all those "programmatic CAD" threads is that some people just really prefer code over anything else. They also build only simple parts, so it's not an issue for them.
As the author says:
"I wanted to write my parts the way I write firmware. In Rust. With types. With version control."
Even as some who would generally prefer graphical CAD software in most cases, sometimes for simple parts like the examples in the linked article code really is just easier.
Sometimes it’s the same when I’m working on texturing for 3D models and I want to combine some texture maps in a specific way, I really don’t want to open Photoshop or similar for something that could be expressed in just a few lines of code. ImageMagick can probably do it, whatever it is, but then I need to learn the incantation.
It depends. I use Solidworks all the time but I think OpenSCAD was a great choice to make this part:
https://github.com/settinger/selectric_typeballs
A bit like how you can edit images in MS Paint, Python, or Photoshop. None of these is or should be a one size fits all solution.
I am trying to do something similar but inside a GUI - https://lilicad.com/ This is still very basic. Also 100% vibe coded and therefore not as robust as I would like it to be.
Eagerly awaiting a demo video
These projects are cool but to me they seem like they all come from the place: a programmer opens up a CAD program, and within days concludes that they would prefer if they could use their existing scripting skills to make something instead of learning to use the program, including the parametric features. Which is fine, but as a mechanical engineer 99% of the useful/required features are not there.
You can do parametric for games too. Building an entire scene using code/data can be very productive when you are trying to tune complex concerns like travel time between arbitrary points on the map (balance). Parametric also makes things like [LLM] automation way more feasible because it's using editor APIs rather than exercising piecemeal scene tools. 1000 lines of c# can do a hell of a lot more damage than a bucket of calls like GetObject, SetComponentProperty, etc. This also allows for much deeper integration and iteration over non-geometric concerns like lighting systems, materials and physics.
> But I do find the graphical interface very natural for doing creative design work. In fact, sometimes I wish I could literally step into my design in VR and grab and move vertices around in 3 dimensions
Agree, it's really hard to do work where you leverage "feels right" together with code, because even if the iteration loop is really tight ("change a bit of code > look at the results"), it's still loose compared to just clicking and dragging, feels like the mental load is a lot less.
Environment art really changed and became a lot easier with VR, I think maybe it's mostly a perspective thing, adjusting with controllers and dragging a moving is great, but the perspective it gives you really has no comparison and makes it all a lot simpler to get right. I can't wait for the tooling to mature more.
Well yeah, that’s the whole point of parametric CAD. I use Fusion360 but everything is a user parameter, use constraints for placements, dimensions are relative fractions of base dimensions, extrudes as distance to a face etc.
To add to this, constructive solid geometry systems like OpenSCAD seem to be practically incapable of doing anything related to surfacing, even if it's just G2 fillets or G2 continuity (much less more advanced work with splines and patches).
I think it's partially a positive feedback loop: the "hacker" tools (OpenSCAD) influence the aesthetic (blocky/square brackets, like in the post), which in turn influences the tools. When creating a simple fillet or a chamfer is an annoying exercise in constructive geometry rather than five mouse clicks, there'll be fewer fillets, chamfers, and flowing surfaces, even when they make mechanical or manufacturing sense; but then that becomes "the look", and people don't even think about fillets.