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What’s OpenSCAD use case? I recently built a printer and started to print things. OpenSCAD was the first software I reached because I’m developer and writing c

What’s OpenSCAD use case? I recently built a printer and started to print things. OpenSCAD was the first software I reached because I’m developer and writing code felt natural for me. But it took so much time and result was kind of hard to understand and change. Then I moved to FreeCAD, learned about parametric modelling and it was like the whole other world. I was like 10x more productive compared to OpenSCAD and result was easy to change and adapt. Then I moved to Fusion and from that point I think that I’ve found a sweet spot, Fusion is similar to FreeCAD, but feels much more polished.

tombert 5y ago
FWIW, I went through the exact opposite progression of what you described (Fusion->FreeCAD->OpenSCAD), and I liked OpenSCAD the best. I feel like I've gotten good models out of it, and have done elaborate enough stuff in the process. I suppose there's no accounting for taste.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 5y ago
  I prefer the style of OpenSCAD but I’ve found that there are certain things that the software just is either really hard to achieve or incapable of doing entirely. One recent example is that I was designing a part for injection molding and I needed to add a draft angle to the part. This seemingly simple operation is rather trivial to do in FreeCAD and Fusion 360. It is not at all trivial in OpenSCAD. Another example of OpenSCAD’s limitations is the render time for parts produced by boolean operations which this change purportedly helps a lot with. But there is also still not a guarantee that the output of those boolean operations is actually a manifold object. Slicers these days are actually quite good at repairing geometry but even with a moderately complex part produced by boolean operations (in my case it was often one that required subtraction of cylinders across multiple pieces of an object) I found OpenSCAD’s output to produce some bizarre issues with geometry that even the slicer could not repair very well. I too like OpenSCAD the best and often find myself more productive in it than other pieces of software, especially for simple models. But for complex models it can’t really hold up to the more traditional parametric modeling software (yet)
  - alpaca128 5y ago
    I only experienced issues with OpenSCADs STLs if I used `difference()` with overlapping surfaces (aka when it flickers in the preview). Even then the slicer's repair feature fixed it. For me the main limitation in OpenSCAD is the UI: distance labels along the XYZ axes are unreadable when they overlap with a surface, transparency only works with one object at a time. Also I'd love highlighted edges in the preview & split view, it would make alignment of parts so much easier. Still I'm so much more productive in it than e.g. FreeCAD because I have most of what I need memorized and the rest can be looked up on the one-page cheatsheet.
- zibzab 5y ago
  For me it was FreeCAD->OpenSCAD->Fusion->back to OpenSCAD. Some tasks are extremely easy in OpenSCAD. Fusion is not that hard either, but it is a commercial tool with a free-ish version where they keep your designs hostage. It doesn't run on Linux which makes life hard for multi platform folks. Also, in past I have had issues with STL generated by Fusion. OpenSCAD is not perfect though, for example is missing important functions such as alignment and assembly
  - vbezhenar 5y ago
    What do you mean by hostage? I can export my work in f3d file and, hopefully, can import it as well.
    - ur-whale 5y ago
      > I can export my work in f3d file One thing Autodesk is truly infamous for industry-wide is being the utter worst when it comes to file formats. They make their file format unreadable by anything other than they products by design. And even within their own product line, it sometimes doesn't work. So I'll ask you this: what can you do with your f3d file? Can you import it into blender to render it with a proper rendering engine? Can you open it with a text editor and change things in it? Can you convert your model to a format that's readable by other tools? Can fusion import models created by other tools?
      - vbezhenar 5y ago
        I can export my file to plenty of other formats. I've used .3mf to move it to prusa slicer, for example.
        ungamedplayer 5y ago
        That's not what is being asked.
        floatboth 5y ago
- parski 5y ago
  This is what I did too.
- hulitu 5y ago
  Every man tastes different.
GravitasFailure 5y ago
It's supposed to really shine with procedurally generated geometry, like fractals, where code really is a more efficient way to describe your object. Some people are also more comfortable describing things with code, so it's useful to them. It might be best to think of it as a platypus: An interesting element of the ecosystem, but disappointing if you need a duck.
- nxpnsv 5y ago
  I think that is unfair to platypuses. Also, I'd better check OpenSCAD out, that sounds like exactly what I have been looking for :)
  - GravitasFailure 5y ago
    Ducks are also lousy at being platypuses, to be fair. Either way, best of luck to you and your new egg laying mammal!
  - tombert 5y ago
    I learned OpenSCAD over the course of a few afternoons, and I'm good enough to get designs for most of the stuff I need. It's really straightforward to get started, so it's definitely worth checking out. The only complaint I've had is that there's not built-in bezier curves, so sometimes you need to spoof things with a bunch of lines or truncating circles. I personally like the code based system, even when it's "harder" simply because it's easy to plop this into version control.
ur-whale 5y ago
> Then I moved to Fusion and from that point I think that I’ve found a sweet spot Alternative viewpoint: 1) It depends on the kind of object you want to model: for simple, geometric shapes, OpenSCAD is by far the best choice. Unless you don't know how to code, in which case it's unusable. 2) When you start to need chamfers and fillets, OpenSCAD simply doesn't work and Fusion is by far the superior solution. Also, if your model starts to become really complex (lots of boolean), OpenSCAD becomes very slow and eventually unusable, even with the change described by the OP. 3) If you need to model organic shapes neither freecad, fusion or OpenSCAD are unusable. Blender is way better for this use case. 4) If you are a programmer and enjoy building truly parametric models, as in: models that you can build with scripts and Makefiles, then neither freecad nor fusion are a fit. Cadquery is slowly getting to the sweet spot OpenScad occupies, but it's not there yet. 5) Fusion is proprietary, closed-source and costs money. Worse, you are basically at the mercy of the vendor. In particular, it's a complete black box: there is exactly zero guarantees that your carefully crafted model will still work 10 years down the road. 6) Freecad's UI is basically a nightmare and the CAD engine (the terminolgy in the CAD world for some reason it is called the "kernel") is the same that cadquery uses, and it's an old and clunky NURBS engine called OpenCascade (if I'm not mistaken). It is definitely not up to par with Fusion's engine. 7) Fusion is lousy at talking to the rest of the ecosystem. Proprietary and opaque file format that no other product outside of the AutoDesk ecosystem can read, lousy at reading things created with other softwares.
- floatboth 5y ago
  > old and clunky NURBS engine called OpenCascade True. Well, it is usable, you can model a whole 3D printer or a (BIM) house or whatever in FreeCAD, people have done big projects with it. But OpenCASCADE really likes to give up (or even crash) on fillets >_<
S0und 5y ago
The use case is sharing a model that is customizable. Exp: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2029895/files https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2029895/files Broom holder. You can't share an STL that will fit every possible broom diameter. But what you can do is programmatically generate one, and let the users change the variables.
- iCarrot 5y ago
  >a model that is customizable That's what parametric modeling do: you have a history of what you did, and traveling back in time to change something like a diameter is trivial.
bsza 5y ago
For me, it's VCS friendliness. Try checking a .fcstd file into git and see what changed between commits. Also, it's extremely reassuring to have a description of your model that wasn't generated by a program. In earlier versions of FreeCAD, my model would often not be saved correctly and be totally broken when I opened it again. FreeCAD also crashed randomly on me quite often. In contrast, all you need for editing .scad files is a text editor, and that probably won't crash that often. :)
- floatboth 5y ago
  Of course nothing is more diffable than code, but you can get git to store proper deltas between FCStd (or any zip) files: https://blog.lambda.cx/posts/freecad-and-git/ https://blog.lambda.cx/posts/freecad-and-git/
  - bsza 5y ago
    > FreeCAD files are nothing more than zip files containing text documents That’s good to know. Though the fact that they’re zipped probably means they are not meant for humans to read anyway. Also, I don’t think GitHub or GitLab supports custom diff tools right now, and you would need that to do actual code reviews.
andreyk 5y ago
I think it depends on the complexity of what you want to model. Lots of 3D printing prototyping is relatively simple shapes, in which case OpenSCAD is quite nice.
IshKebab 5y ago
It's useful for highly repetitive shapes, or ones that are derived computationally, or are extremely parametric. Examples are: * Fasteners (screws, nuts, etc.) * Gears, sprockets, etc. * Computational art 99% of the time you want real parametric CAD (Solidworks etc.). Nobody is going to design a motorbike or a door handle or a vice with OpenSCAD.
GabeIsko 5y ago
Having 3D objects described in a text based environment is the idea. That way you can version them with git. It is also focused on supporting Volumetric modeling of 3d objects, rather than simply being CSG based like most CAD software, even though it takes that approach for simple objects. It is really a product of open source 3d printers who were seeking a way to describe complex 3d objects, reliably version them, and then spread them around the internet. It's a cool idea, but it's toolchain has always been sub par. It is my understanding that most of the people working on it are more concerned with getting it good enough, and the bulk of their development energy on 3d printing slicing engines. But I wouldn't want to use OpenSCAD to do any traditional design work or drafting, or really even to design any object that will have to be made with subtractive manufacturing. It's a happy medium that FreeCAD has an OpenSCAD workbench - that way you can do the complicated stuff directly in OpenSCAD for 3D printed parts, and then include them in your FreeCAD assemblies.

tombert 5y ago

FWIW, I went through the exact opposite progression of what you described (Fusion->FreeCAD->OpenSCAD), and I liked OpenSCAD the best. I feel like I've gotten good models out of it, and have done elaborate enough stuff in the process. I suppose there's no accounting for taste.

SOLAR_FIELDS 5y ago
I prefer the style of OpenSCAD but I’ve found that there are certain things that the software just is either really hard to achieve or incapable of doing entirely. One recent example is that I was designing a part for injection molding and I needed to add a draft angle to the part. This seemingly simple operation is rather trivial to do in FreeCAD and Fusion 360. It is not at all trivial in OpenSCAD. Another example of OpenSCAD’s limitations is the render time for parts produced by boolean operations which this change purportedly helps a lot with. But there is also still not a guarantee that the output of those boolean operations is actually a manifold object. Slicers these days are actually quite good at repairing geometry but even with a moderately complex part produced by boolean operations (in my case it was often one that required subtraction of cylinders across multiple pieces of an object) I found OpenSCAD’s output to produce some bizarre issues with geometry that even the slicer could not repair very well. I too like OpenSCAD the best and often find myself more productive in it than other pieces of software, especially for simple models. But for complex models it can’t really hold up to the more traditional parametric modeling software (yet)
- alpaca128 5y ago
  I only experienced issues with OpenSCADs STLs if I used `difference()` with overlapping surfaces (aka when it flickers in the preview). Even then the slicer's repair feature fixed it. For me the main limitation in OpenSCAD is the UI: distance labels along the XYZ axes are unreadable when they overlap with a surface, transparency only works with one object at a time. Also I'd love highlighted edges in the preview & split view, it would make alignment of parts so much easier. Still I'm so much more productive in it than e.g. FreeCAD because I have most of what I need memorized and the rest can be looked up on the one-page cheatsheet.
zibzab 5y ago
For me it was FreeCAD->OpenSCAD->Fusion->back to OpenSCAD. Some tasks are extremely easy in OpenSCAD. Fusion is not that hard either, but it is a commercial tool with a free-ish version where they keep your designs hostage. It doesn't run on Linux which makes life hard for multi platform folks. Also, in past I have had issues with STL generated by Fusion. OpenSCAD is not perfect though, for example is missing important functions such as alignment and assembly
- vbezhenar 5y ago
  What do you mean by hostage? I can export my work in f3d file and, hopefully, can import it as well.
  - ur-whale 5y ago
    > I can export my work in f3d file One thing Autodesk is truly infamous for industry-wide is being the utter worst when it comes to file formats. They make their file format unreadable by anything other than they products by design. And even within their own product line, it sometimes doesn't work. So I'll ask you this: what can you do with your f3d file? Can you import it into blender to render it with a proper rendering engine? Can you open it with a text editor and change things in it? Can you convert your model to a format that's readable by other tools? Can fusion import models created by other tools?
    - vbezhenar 5y ago
      I can export my file to plenty of other formats. I've used .3mf to move it to prusa slicer, for example.
      - ungamedplayer 5y ago
        That's not what is being asked.
        floatboth 5y ago
parski 5y ago
This is what I did too.
hulitu 5y ago
Every man tastes different.

GravitasFailure 5y ago

It's supposed to really shine with procedurally generated geometry, like fractals, where code really is a more efficient way to describe your object. Some people are also more comfortable describing things with code, so it's useful to them. It might be best to think of it as a platypus: An interesting element of the ecosystem, but disappointing if you need a duck.

nxpnsv 5y ago
I think that is unfair to platypuses. Also, I'd better check OpenSCAD out, that sounds like exactly what I have been looking for :)
- GravitasFailure 5y ago
  Ducks are also lousy at being platypuses, to be fair. Either way, best of luck to you and your new egg laying mammal!
- tombert 5y ago
  I learned OpenSCAD over the course of a few afternoons, and I'm good enough to get designs for most of the stuff I need. It's really straightforward to get started, so it's definitely worth checking out. The only complaint I've had is that there's not built-in bezier curves, so sometimes you need to spoof things with a bunch of lines or truncating circles. I personally like the code based system, even when it's "harder" simply because it's easy to plop this into version control.

ur-whale 5y ago

> Then I moved to Fusion and from that point I think that I’ve found a sweet spot Alternative viewpoint: 1) It depends on the kind of object you want to model: for simple, geometric shapes, OpenSCAD is by far the best choice. Unless you don't know how to code, in which case it's unusable. 2) When you start to need chamfers and fillets, OpenSCAD simply doesn't work and Fusion is by far the superior solution. Also, if your model starts to become really complex (lots of boolean), OpenSCAD becomes very slow and eventually unusable, even with the change described by the OP. 3) If you need to model organic shapes neither freecad, fusion or OpenSCAD are unusable. Blender is way better for this use case. 4) If you are a programmer and enjoy building truly parametric models, as in: models that you can build with scripts and Makefiles, then neither freecad nor fusion are a fit. Cadquery is slowly getting to the sweet spot OpenScad occupies, but it's not there yet. 5) Fusion is proprietary, closed-source and costs money. Worse, you are basically at the mercy of the vendor. In particular, it's a complete black box: there is exactly zero guarantees that your carefully crafted model will still work 10 years down the road. 6) Freecad's UI is basically a nightmare and the CAD engine (the terminolgy in the CAD world for some reason it is called the "kernel") is the same that cadquery uses, and it's an old and clunky NURBS engine called OpenCascade (if I'm not mistaken). It is definitely not up to par with Fusion's engine. 7) Fusion is lousy at talking to the rest of the ecosystem. Proprietary and opaque file format that no other product outside of the AutoDesk ecosystem can read, lousy at reading things created with other softwares.

floatboth 5y ago
> old and clunky NURBS engine called OpenCascade True. Well, it is usable, you can model a whole 3D printer or a (BIM) house or whatever in FreeCAD, people have done big projects with it. But OpenCASCADE really likes to give up (or even crash) on fillets >_<

S0und 5y ago

The use case is sharing a model that is customizable. Exp: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2029895/files https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:2029895/files Broom holder. You can't share an STL that will fit every possible broom diameter. But what you can do is programmatically generate one, and let the users change the variables.

iCarrot 5y ago
>a model that is customizable That's what parametric modeling do: you have a history of what you did, and traveling back in time to change something like a diameter is trivial.

bsza 5y ago

For me, it's VCS friendliness. Try checking a .fcstd file into git and see what changed between commits. Also, it's extremely reassuring to have a description of your model that wasn't generated by a program. In earlier versions of FreeCAD, my model would often not be saved correctly and be totally broken when I opened it again. FreeCAD also crashed randomly on me quite often. In contrast, all you need for editing .scad files is a text editor, and that probably won't crash that often. :)

floatboth 5y ago
Of course nothing is more diffable than code, but you can get git to store proper deltas between FCStd (or any zip) files: https://blog.lambda.cx/posts/freecad-and-git/ https://blog.lambda.cx/posts/freecad-and-git/
- bsza 5y ago
  > FreeCAD files are nothing more than zip files containing text documents That’s good to know. Though the fact that they’re zipped probably means they are not meant for humans to read anyway. Also, I don’t think GitHub or GitLab supports custom diff tools right now, and you would need that to do actual code reviews.

andreyk 5y ago

I think it depends on the complexity of what you want to model. Lots of 3D printing prototyping is relatively simple shapes, in which case OpenSCAD is quite nice.

IshKebab 5y ago

It's useful for highly repetitive shapes, or ones that are derived computationally, or are extremely parametric. Examples are: * Fasteners (screws, nuts, etc.) * Gears, sprockets, etc. * Computational art 99% of the time you want real parametric CAD (Solidworks etc.). Nobody is going to design a motorbike or a door handle or a vice with OpenSCAD.

GabeIsko 5y ago

Having 3D objects described in a text based environment is the idea. That way you can version them with git. It is also focused on supporting Volumetric modeling of 3d objects, rather than simply being CSG based like most CAD software, even though it takes that approach for simple objects. It is really a product of open source 3d printers who were seeking a way to describe complex 3d objects, reliably version them, and then spread them around the internet. It's a cool idea, but it's toolchain has always been sub par. It is my understanding that most of the people working on it are more concerned with getting it good enough, and the bulk of their development energy on 3d printing slicing engines. But I wouldn't want to use OpenSCAD to do any traditional design work or drafting, or really even to design any object that will have to be made with subtractive manufacturing. It's a happy medium that FreeCAD has an OpenSCAD workbench - that way you can do the complicated stuff directly in OpenSCAD for 3D printed parts, and then include them in your FreeCAD assemblies.