Development roadmap
FreeCAD - though usable in many applications - is at the beginning of a long journey into CAD mainstream. There is still a lot to do to reach a state where we can compete with commercial software.
This section gives an overview of what is planned and gives you the opportunity to participate or give your opinion. As we are volunteers to FreeCAD we have only a certain amount of time. So if you interested in one of the topics and willing to help, just let us know! We use the Getting Things Done (GTD) style for the project document. Here is the Project template.
- The Organization chart shows who does what in the FreeCAD universe.
- You can follow issues that are currently being worked on via the bugtracker here: http://www.freecadweb.org/tracker/roadmap_page.php
Projects
Project | Description | Category | Status |
---|---|---|---|
STEP project | about improving and advancing the STEP support in FreeCAD | Modeling, File formats | Current |
Naming project | is about implementing a robust Shape referencing frame work. | Modeling | Current |
FreeCAD development model project | move FreeCAD to a more capable development model | Development process | Current |
Sketcher project | is ongoing implementation of the constraint/parametric Sketcher | Modeling, 2D contstraints | Current |
PartDesign project | is the effort towards a working part-design in FreeCAD | Modeling | Current |
Assembly project | creates a assembly module which handle product creation, part-lists and some kinematics. | Modeling, 3D constraints | Current |
Architecture project | will throw the bases of a modern, parametric architectural modeling environment. | Modeling, BIM | Current |
Units project | finally get FreeCAD to recognize different Units and Units-systems. | Modeling, Manufacturing documentation, Dimensions and referencing | Current |
Resource framework project | address the user collaboration, PDM catalog/standard part stuff | Cloud, Databases, BOM | Current |
Quality project | aims to hide unfinished features and improve the documentation. | Development process | Current |
Raytracing project | provide a new generic interface for external renderers for visualisation | 3D visualization | Current |
UTF Project | aims to update FreeCAD's Coin3D interface to utilise UTF Strings for better multilanguage experience with non ASCII characters | Internationalization | Current |
FEM project | provides a FEM module in FreeCAD. | Modeling, Analysis | Current |
Material data model | Effort to describe a material data model in FreeCAD | Modeling | Current |
Python 3 | Porting FreeCAD to Python 3. | Development tools | Current |
HiDPI support | Supporting scalability on 4K displays. | GUI | Current |
Tolerancing | The support of modeling tolerances, using international standards (ISO 1101 / ASME Y14.5, ISO 16792 / ASME Y14.41) | Modeling, Manufacturing documentation, Dimensions and referencing | Current |
Land Survey Workbench Blueprint | Future | ||
Robot project | A Robot simulation workbench | Modeling, 3D constraints | Finished |
Release schedule
Like in the most FLOSS projects a release schedule is very rough. There will be no fixed dates and "It's done, when it's done!"
- The Release process page gather ideas for a more efficient release workflow