Freecad screenshot -- Arduino (Eagle import)

FreeCAD is a general-purpose parametric 3D

computer-aided design Computer-aided design (CAD) is the use of computers (or ) to aid in the creation, modification, analysis, or optimization of a design. This software is used to increase the productivity of the designer, improve the quality of design, improve co ...

(CAD) modeler and a

building information modeling Building information modeling (BIM) is a process supported by various tools, technologies and contracts involving the generation and management of digital representations of physical and functional characteristics of places. Building informatio ...

(BIM) software application with

finite element method The finite element method (FEM) is a popular method for numerically solving differential equations arising in engineering and mathematical modeling. Typical problem areas of interest include the traditional fields of structural analysis, heat ...

(FEM) support. It is intended for

mechanical engineering Mechanical engineering is the study of physical machines that may involve force and movement. It is an engineering branch that combines engineering physics and mathematics principles with materials science, to design, analyze, manufacture, ...

product design but also expands to a wider range of uses around engineering, such as architecture or electrical engineering. FreeCAD is

free and open-source Free and open-source software (FOSS) is a term used to refer to groups of software consisting of both free software and open-source software where anyone is freely licensed to use, copy, study, and change the software in any way, and the source ...

, under the LGPL-2.0-or-later license, and available for

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, whi ...

macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and la ...

, and

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for se ...

operating systems. Users can extend the functionality of the software using the Python programming language.

Features

General

FreeCAD features tools similar to

CATIA CATIA (, an acronym of computer-aided three-dimensional interactive application) is a multi-platform software suite for computer-aided design (CAD), computer-aided manufacturing (CAM), computer-aided engineering (CAE), 3D modeling and Product ...

, Creo,

SolidWorks SolidWorks is a solid modeling computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided engineering (CAE) application published by Dassault Systèmes. According to the publisher, over two million engineers and designers at more than 165,000 companies w ...

, Solid Edge, NX,

Inventor An invention is a unique or novel device, method, composition, idea or process. An invention may be an improvement upon a machine, product, or process for increasing efficiency or lowering cost. It may also be an entirely new concept. If an ...

, Revit, and therefore also falls into the category of

(BIM), mechanical computer-aided design (MCAD), PLM, CAx and CAE. It is intended to be a feature-based parametric modeler with a modular software architecture, which makes it easy to provide additional functionality without modifying the core system. As with many modern 3D CAD modelers, FreeCAD has a 2D component to facilitate 3D-to-2D drawing conversion. Under its current state, direct 2D drawing (like AutoCAD LT) is not the focus for this software, and neither are animation or 3D model manipulation (like

Blender A blender (sometimes called a mixer or liquidiser in British English) is a kitchen and laboratory appliance used to mix, crush, purée or emulsify food and other substances. A stationary blender consists of a blender container with a rotating me ...

Maya Maya may refer to: Civilizations * Maya peoples, of southern Mexico and northern Central America ** Maya civilization, the historical civilization of the Maya peoples ** Maya language, the languages of the Maya peoples * Maya (Ethiopia), a popul ...

, or

Cinema 4D Cinema 4D is a 3D software suite developed by the German company Maxon. Overview As of R21, only one version of Cinema 4D is available. It replaces all previous variants, including BodyPaint 3D, and includes all features of the past 'Studio' ...

). However, the modular nature of FreeCAD allows the user to adapt its workflow for such environments via the use of plugins. FreeCAD uses open-source libraries from the field of

computing science Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to practical disciplines (including ...

; among them are

Open CASCADE Technology Open Cascade Technology (OCCT), formerly called ''CAS.CADE'', is an open-source software development platform for 3D CAD, CAM, CAE, etc. that is developed and supported by Open Cascade SAS. OCCT is a full-scale B-Rep (Boundary representatio ...

(a CAD kernel),

Coin3D Coin3D is a free and open-source implementation (library) of the Open Inventor API. Coin3D was originally developed and maintained as commercial software by the Norwegian company Kongsberg Oil & Gas Technologies (formerly Kongsberg SIM). Coin3 ...

(an incarnation of Open Inventor), the Qt GUI framework, and Python, a popular scripting language. FreeCAD itself can also be used as a library by other programs. There are moves to expand FreeCAD in the

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing buildings ...

electrical Electricity is the set of physical phenomena associated with the presence and motion of matter that has a property of electric charge. Electricity is related to magnetism, both being part of the phenomenon of electromagnetism, as described ...

, and

construction Construction is a general term meaning the art and science to form objects, systems, or organizations,"Construction" def. 1.a. 1.b. and 1.c. ''Oxford English Dictionary'' Second Edition on CD-ROM (v. 4.0) Oxford University Press 2009 and ...

(AEC)

engineering Engineering is the use of scientific principles to design and build machines, structures, and other items, including bridges, tunnels, roads, vehicles, and buildings. The discipline of engineering encompasses a broad range of more speciali ...

sectors and to add

(BIM) functionality with the Arch Module. As of late 2020, 3D Models searcher of CADENAS calle
''3DfindIT.com''
is integrated into FreeCAD.

Supported file formats

FreeCAD's own main file format is FreeCAD Standard file format (.FCStd). It is a standard zip file that holds files in a certain structure. Document.

xml Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable. T ...

file has all geometric and parametric objects definitions. GuiDocument.xml then has visual representation details of objects. Other files include brep-files for objects and thumbnail of drawing. Besides FreeCAD's own file format, files can be exported and imported in DXF, SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics), STEP,

IGES The Initial Graphics Exchange Specification (IGES) is a vendor-neutral file format that allows the digital exchange of information among computer-aided design (CAD) systems. It's an ASCII-based textual format. The official title of IGES is ''Dig ...

, STL (STereoLithography), OBJ (Wavefront), DAE (Collada), SCAD (OpenSCAD), IV (Inventor) and IFC.

DWG support

FreeCAD's support for the important DWG file format has been problematic due to

software license A software license is a legal instrument (usually by way of contract law, with or without printed material) governing the use or redistribution of software. Under United States copyright law, all software is copyright protected, in both sourc ...

compatibility problems with the

GNU LibreDWG GNU LibreDWG is a software library programmed in C to manage DWG computer files, native proprietary format of computer-aided design software AutoCAD. It aims to be a free software replacement for the OpenDWG libraries. The project is managed ...

library. The GNU LibreDWG library started as a real free alternative to the source-available

OpenDWG Open Design Alliance is a nonprofit organization creating software development kits (SDKs) for engineering applications. ODA offers interoperability tools for CAD, BIM, and Mechanical industries including .dwg, .dxf, .dgn, Autodesk Revit, Autodes ...

library (later Teigha Converter and now ODA File Converter) and is licensed under the

GPLv3 The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL or simply GPL) is a series of widely used free software licenses that guarantee end users the four freedoms to run, study, share, and modify the software. The license was the first copyleft for general u ...

. As FreeCAD (and also LibreCAD) has dependencies on Open Cascade, which prior to version 6.7.0 was only compatible with GPLv2, it couldn't use the GNU LibreDWG library as GPLv2 and GPLv3 are essentially incompatible. Open CASCADE technology was contacted by

Debian Debian (), also known as Debian GNU/Linux, is a Linux distribution composed of free and open-source software, developed by the community-supported Debian Project, which was established by Ian Murdock on August 16, 1993. The first version of De ...

team in 2009, and 2012 got a reply that Open CASCADE technology was considering dual-licensing OCCT (the library), however they postponed that move. A request also went to the FSF to relicense GNU LibreDWG as GPLv2 or LGPLv3, which was rejected. As of 2014 the 0.14 release of FreeCAD, including the new LGPL release of Open Cascade, the BSD-licensed version of Coin3D, and the removal of PyQT, FreeCAD is now completely GPL-free. However, LibreDWG has not been adopted. FreeCAD is able to import and export a limited subset of the DWG format via the ODA File Converter (the former OpenDWG library).

Promotions during events

FreeCAD was notably presented at FISL 16 in 2015, in

Porto Alegre Porto Alegre (, , Brazilian ; ) is the capital and largest city of the Brazilian state of Rio Grande do Sul. Its population of 1,488,252 inhabitants (2020) makes it the twelfth most populous city in the country and the center of Brazil's fif ...

, as well as at the Libre Graphics Meeting in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

in 2016. These two exhibitions can bring together both developers and users. In 2020, it was during

FOSDEM Free and Open source Software Developers' European Meeting (FOSDEM) is a non-commercial, volunteer-organized European event centered on free and open-source software development. It is aimed at developers and anyone interested in the free and ...

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

that two of these developers, Yorik Van Havre and Brad Collette made the presentation.

Release history

* GitHub Files section ()

Notes

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:FreeCAD 2002 software Computer-aided design software for Linux Computer-aided design software for Unix Computer-aided design software for Windows Engineering software that uses Qt Free computer-aided design software Free software programmed in C++ Free software programmed in Python MacOS computer-aided design software BIM software Software using the LGPL license Software that uses VTK