alt Hacker NewsI think I'm realizing that openscad was probably just the first time that parametric design options were given to me in a context where it made sense to me (in code). Maybe some of the software I've used has supported parametric positioning, but it wasn't made obvious to me. In OpenSCAD it's parametric by necessity. I said this in another comment, but the other programs I've worked with in GUI are most certainly not high end pieces of software: tinkercad, freecad, sketchup.
I'm not doing complex character model designs, I'm usually building functional prints like enclosures or cases. It certainly sounds like there are features of better CAD software that makes parametric the default?
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If you're doing enclosures, check out Dune3d! Has been featured here as well (it's how I found it). It's pretty easy to use and feels intuitive for prints you'll only have to make once or twice. It's missing some things here or there but nothing fundamental (except trimming edges i.m.o.)
I often switch between FreeCad and Dune3d now, Freecad for things I know how to design properly and Dune when I'm in 'claying' mode. E.g. export a .step part when I get stuck in FreeCad, import it into Dune, make some progress and vice versa so I don't walk away from the project
Oh, it is not that software like freecad is not parametric by necessity; it is just that in a parametric design process, you don't set all the parameters at once. Why? Because a) you don't overconstraint a design, and b) your parameters rely on references (a point, a line, the side of another object, a tangent), and you may want to change which reference you choose.
For example, if you put a hole in a box, do you want to reference the center of the sides of the hole? And do you want to place them relative to the left side or right side, and front or back? You never say "it's x mm from the left and y mm from the right and my box is w mm wide" - because the relationship x+y=w is always here! You only define 2 out of 3. But it may happen that you picked the wrong 2 - and a parametric CAD makes it very easy to do so in a few clicks, while a programmatic CAD like OpenSCAD is a large rewrite with calculation you have to do yourself on the side.
My example is silly but start doing big designs, large assemblies, and you "chains of cotations" may need to be redone again and again - especially when tolerances begin to add up.
I think I understand this — I mean, OpenSCAD was my brief gateway to parametric CAD, and then I got to FreeCAD via brief stepping stones of CadQuery and other packages.
But OpenSCAD isn't really parametric CAD. It's a programming language; it's parametric for that reason. But it's not really CAD, at another level, in the sense that it does nothing to "aid" your design work. It has no interim abstraction for generated geometry; everything must be explicitly described.
FreeCAD, though, is profoundly parametric, through and through, and really always has been. Indeed the parametric aspects are the main thing that made it workable before the TNP mitigations were added. It is not a limited CAD package, by any means. It's just a somewhat unfriendly one with a CAD kernel that has some limitations. Really it's almost better understood as a 3D IDE with some workflow affordances.
If you are stuck trying to get your head into how FreeCAD works, there are now three really good ways on Youtube: the Mango Jelly Solutions videos are incredible, the Shawn Hymnel/Digikey FreeCAD and 3D Printing course is good, and there are great recent videos by Deltahedra.
But what you will be able to make with it, once you get your head into it, is night and day different to what is possible with OpenSCAD. Because your parametric work in FreeCAD (or other CAD packages) can operate on the geometry of the result of previous operations.
Give it a try in the New Year with FreeCAD 1.1 when it is released.
If you want another stepping stone from OpenSCAD to FreeCAD or any other package, I really recommend you look at CadQuery/Build123D. This will give you a similar coding approach but it will introduce you to operations on the true faces, edges and vertexes of the output of other operations.
(FWIW I would not say that Sketchup is not high end, either. It's not to my tastes but it is quite powerful)
FreeCAD is definitely parametric but I hear you that the interface doesn't make it obvious. It might be worth another look particularly since it's interoperable with OpenSCAD and can work on CSG trees within the interface
At least you've inspired me to try it and see if it's "worth writing home about"
https://wiki.freecad.org/OpenSCAD_Workbench