Blender Cad Software Add-On

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  • make a cad software add-on for Blender
    • cad add-on needs to perform like or better than the best cad software
    • cad add-on should be debugged and free
  • the “Mesh: LoopTools” add-on should work more like a cad software
    • when “Scene-Units-Unit System” is switched to Metric/Imperial
      • “Mesh: LoopTools” should switch also
      • when using the “LoopTools circle”
        • turn radius on
          • should know the radius of the circle you created
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Well, probably not exactly what you are looking for but as a starting point there is the TinyCad add-on:

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CAD features have been suggested before, but I’m not sure how you could add an “industry standard” level CAD package to Blender for free. Adding a large number of complex new features like this to Blender would require multiple full-time devs to create and maintain. This is not something the Blender Foundation is likely to take on as the current Blender devs are already have more than enough to do just building and maintaining Blender’s existing feature set. In order to make this happen you would need a second development fund specifically for these features.

This is not to say adding CAD features to Blender is impossible, there already is several impressive options (for example: Archipack, Sverchok, and Mechanical Blender), but trying to find ways to support and maintain them is often an issue. This is why many Blender’s add-ons and other third party customizations end up stagnating or going commercial.

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Something like that ? It got a lot of upvotes too, I think blender dev and users really underestimate awesomeness of precise modeling tool. Users who use blender for Cad also constitue 30% of users, there was a poll’ last week on blender artist done on 150peoples

For architecture I use sketchup and autocad, those are really simple shitty programs, the fact that blender can’t compete with those is quite frustrating and a deception for cad users.

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5

Am I missing something here? Blender can already do stuff like midpoint snapping, edge snapping, and welding. The interface for these tools isn’t always as nice as what you would get in many CAD programs, but the options exist. Some of the other ideas listed there (like the shape tools) are planned, but a long ways off as Blender’s current devs are already swamped with work just trying to finish up 2.80.

For architecture, Blender starts with a big disadvantage compared to sketchup and autocad as those programs were designed from the ground up for doing CAD work. Blender was designed for artistic modeling and animation, so it doesn’t internally track things like edge lengths, a circle’s radius, or coplaner surfaces like sketchup would. This makes it more difficult to bring these tool sets into Blender as you would have to build and maintain that information yourself.

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let see what your average CAD user want in a 3D software, let says architects, a woodworker who want to model a cabinet in 3D, the little family who want to see the space of their new potential house plan in 3D, your average joe who do some work in the garden every sunday…

  1. upgrade the snapping system (aka more easy to use, snap to midpoints, snap to center of face, snap projection) -> could actually benefit everyone
  2. a few little new easy tools: snap move (already in snap utilities) , snap rotate (already in snap utilities), snap resize, snap mirror.-> could actually benefit everyone.
  3. an official support for destructive extrude. -> could actually benefit everyone
  4. fix the intersect tool so that it actually work with 2D lines and aligned meshes -> could actually benefit everyone
  5. fix the knife tool so it respond to the XYZ axis and use snap correctly -> could actually benefit everyone.
  6. an offset tool, that also work for 2D line
  7. a project line tool officially supported not only by tiny cad
    (bonus because i really like it: an easy line tool that auto create face like sketchup)
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