[Bf-committers] Google Summer of Code 2016 - Adding CAD functionality to Blender

[João Araújo]

Good afternoon,

I am a college student who has known Blender for a few years now, and would
like to contribute in GSoC 2016 by adding CAD functionality. I would like
to ear your thoughts on my project idea.

I have been checking on what has been done to implement CAD in Blender. I
didn't find almost any software. Mostly there were forum discussions about
how great it would be if Blender could have CAD features, while others
stated that it would be impractical.

The only actual add-on I found was this one

http://www.cad4arch.com/cadtools/index.htm

but although it is still being developed, it is paid and only works with
Blender 2.49b. The author states an intention of embedding it into Blender,
though.

>From what I read, and based on my experience working with CAD packages, I
compiled a list of targets for what I would propose myself to achieve
during GSoC:

ordered from most important to less important

  - Add a new editor that would allow the user to make ISO-compliant
drawings of individual parts.
      - This requires, from the top of my head, the ability of drawing the
6 isometric views, at a standard scale, on standard sized paper (A4, A3,
etc.), adding dimensions (lengths and angles), centerlines, axes, being
able to do section views (with crosshatch drawing) and detail views.
  - Add sketch tools (the ability to draw lines, circles, rectangles, etc.
; this serves the purpose of increasing the precision of drawing with
Blender)
  - Add reference geometry (reference planes and axes)
  - Add a dimensioning tool (something that allows the user to edit the
dimensions a posteriori the sketch being created)
  - Modify the array modifier in order to allow explicit circular arrays
       - This can already be achieved using a trick with empties, but I
would like to clarify this workflow and simplify it (for example, instead
of the user rotating the empty by 360/n degrees, where n is the number of
objects, he would simply select n and the modifier would take care of the
rest)
  - Add a fillet tool (a very simple addition; can be done with vertex
groups and the bevel modifier currently; once again I simply want to
simplify it)
  - Add a precise offset tool (currently, I can simply extrude and scale ;
I want to make this work with the dimensioning tool mentioned above)


I believe these are all feasible by me, with the first one being the most
complex and one of the few requiring C programming. The others could be
implemented as a Python Add-On.

Best regards,
Joao