Show HN: Replicad, the Library for CAD in the Browser
replicad.xyz
replicad.xyz
The main inspiration were CadQuery and cascade studio. These are two great projects, but my needs were different.
Originally I wanted to create a browser based generator for token trays. I prefer not to have any code running on a server (so I don’t need to pay or operate them). So CadQuery was out of the picture. It needed to be in javascript.
I really liked what Cascade Studio was doing - but I wanted to create my own UI for configuring boxes - and the studio is only an integrated environment - there was no library to just make the models.
So replicad was born! You can read the docs at https://replicad.xyz/ (and play with the workbench at https://studio.replicad.xyz/workbench)
How hard would it be to make your workbench pull and render code from GitHub repositories, so that for example, authors can link to a render of the codebase in their readme?
This is really great work btw. A pleasure to tinker with. Following closely.
You can already do some of this. Either by pointing to an encoded url (something like this: https://studio.replicad.xyz/workbench?from-url=https%253A%25...).
There is also a share arrow which will put the current code in an url param (and you can have something like this: https://studio.replicad.xyz/workbench?code=UEsDBAoAAAAIANhzV...
In the docs, the example pages have a nice 'configuration' dropdown. Again, this is very nice and I can see a bunch of 3D printing websites adopting this as a library. I mean, how many times have you seen a model that just needs a slight tweak to be perfect, but there is just too much friction (download, unpack, load, modify, resave, reupload).
On another note, I wonder if I can train a small LLM to the docs. Once trained, I would be able to have a conversation to create some really cool geometry. Hmmm...
Some suggestions (I'm sure you've already thought of most of these):
- It would be great to have notebook-like UI to isolate steps and allow faster partial rebuilds.
- live editing is great, but it'd be nice to automatically stop in-progress rebuild if another edit is made while it's computing. Right now it seems to always let a rebuild complete even if it's already out-of-date.
- Search on API/docs page would be really handy
- Face/vertex filtering API looks cleaner than CadQuery's, and I'm excited to try it out. In a lot of cases I would still really like to just be able to click on the model and get a reference in code. Even if it's just an index that would break if topology has changed. Auto-generating stable references/filters would be even better, when possible.
Great idea, I have done something in that spirit integrating with natto.dev, but something more like a repl might be nice as well (https://natto.dev/@sgenoud/e2ade00d1fb4406abe78061e7f9a959b)
> - Search on API/docs page would be really handy
Good point, I use docusaurus, there is an algolia integration, I will look into it!
> Even if it's just an index that would break if topology has changed. Auto-generating stable references/filters would be even better, when possible.
Definitely the reference should be easy to implement, the stable one... less so.
I have tried to implement a filtering method inspired by cad query but which did not invent its own DSL. Always interested in feedback!
Once you get how it works googling the name of the OC methods helps sometimes. But there is not much around.
I'm looking for CAD libraries for our project at bldrs.ai and have been considering replicad.
Could you describe the relationship with OpenCascade/OCJS.org and also the other projects using it. Replicad is listed on their README as one of 4 design tools using it. CascadeStudio and your project seem to be similarly targeting general use scripting. Are you in touch, with any thoughts on how to collaborate?
I'm also curious How do you see the health of OpenCascade. The last commit 8 mo ago and their issues look like it's getting difficult to build. But I understand it's also a singularly valuable open-source CAD kernel.
Thanks, any thoughts appreciated!
The person maintaining OCJS works on in bursts - it depends on the time he has. He is doing a great job at it!
The difference between replicad and Cascade Studio is that replicad is a library first - that you can include in your specific project. As a proof of concept I built a development environment while Cascade Studio is meant as a development environment first. Different aims with different tradeoffs.
People around code cad have been interacting a bit in the CadHub discord - but it is a bit quieter lately!
Yes, joined CadHub last year but yeah, a little quiet. I'll say hi again
Mentions an interesting video[2] going through the commercial geometry kernel options and their resp. limitations from the author of [3].
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34856383
Context: I have design and shipped physical products (injection mold plastic), but have found the parametric support in Fusion to be almost unusable, as it's tied to the order of operations. For a recent laser cutting project, I did the CAD in HTML—using JS to lay out SVG elements based on input fields for all the parameters.
Given the above, Replicad is a 100% fit for my philosophy and needs:
• Code-driven, so I can completely control how things are parameterized (and use arbitrary expressions)
• Text-based, so I can work in a Git repo
• Open source & web based, so I don't worry that I'll lose the ability to view or edit old files in the future
• Well-funded core (OpenCascade), so I have reasonable hope that it will continue to receive updates
• Human-friendly documentation, so I can find what I need quickly
Really nice work!
Trying to implement even the simplest version of this has been a project killer.
Really, the piece that drove me to eventually give up was getting a vertex or edge to be selected, rather than the whole object. Its not difficult to calculate for simple shapes, but what is really needed is a general solution, that doesn't depend on shapes being regular polygons.
Is this something people have done with Replicad? Perhaps with an additional lib for parsing SVG into a set of 2D curves?
You can find the code (with SVG import) here: https://github.com/sgenoud/replicad-decorate and https://github.com/sgenoud/blingmything
And use it like this (it does not work in Firefox yet, it needs module workers): https://studio.replicad.xyz/workbench?code=UEsDBAoAAAAIAIyZV...
could you compare and contrast replicad to JSCAD (https://openjscad.xyz)?
the examples in your docs are quite sluggish to load in Safari, but the workbench is very snappy!
BRep is the equivalent of a vector image. It has the advantage of having the notions of faces and edges within the representation. This is what replicad uses.
Meshes is the equivalent of a raster image. This is how 3D art is usually made. It has some performance advantages. This is what JSCAD uses.
The reason the example took some time to load is that the code needed to get to the page a first time. After this it is snappy everywhere.
FILE_SCHEMA(('AUTOMOTIVE_DESIGN { 1 0 10303 214 1 1 1 1 }'));
FILE_SCHEMA(('AP242_MANAGED_MODEL_BASED_3D_ENGINEERING_MIM_LF {1 0 10303 442 1 1 4}'));
In terms of an ecosystem it’s quite good, but the language frustrates me. It is powerful in its own way, but primitive, and I really wish that it just became a library that was used within an established language.
There are alternatives, but nothing that has really attracted me.
Until now. Good work.
Have you considered reaching out to Thingiverse? They have OpenSCAD integration so users can change parameters and download the resulting STL files, but this seems like it’d suit their ecosystem just as much - if not more.
I especially like the "spinning amorphous blob" result that happens on an error.