BricsCAD Shape - free download

[f700es]

OK, played a bit more with it and modeled a small shed.

I don't like how it auto-highlights faces, lines and such when you move your mouse over objects. I find this rather distracting.

To me this complicates the selection process. I do like the built in AutoCAD command line style commands (l=line, e=erase, etc..)

This was about 10 min worth of playing.

 

[rkmcswain]

So what is Bricsys really trying to do here?

 

One advantage to Shape is that its native file format is .DWG.

From a Bricsys marketing standpoint, Shape should lead some people into the paid products.

Just my 2¢

[f700es]

It also is a way to get people into the Bricsys family. Brilliant marketing to be honest.

 

What I was thinking earlier

[nukecad]

Is this going to be of use to engineers, or is it just/mainly for buildings?

 

EDIT

I see halam already modeled a trailer as part of his upload in post #5, so some engineering content there.

(I spent 10 years of my life designing trailers).

 

I'll download it and give it a whirl when I get time.

[f700es]

I guess you could but with Fusion 360 out there why would you?

[halam]

The trailors are imported skp files. Works a lot better than any autodesk conversion i've seen to import. I say goodbye to Automapki with Shape available. Notice that if you take a dive into the registry you will find all the familiar setvar. So you can tweak some. Many the surface highlight can be turned off also. I killed the horizon. Pity the background is hardcoded to white. Black is useful for 2d imo

 

*Edit. Dwg tools can be used for Anything! About that thing called Bim .. Other discussion , better talked about elsewhere

[f700es]

Not sure if it imports SU better than "any" AuotDesk tool but it does add some fluff to the file. I have a house I modeled in SU that I brought into ACAD 2108 and Shape. I saved both to 2018 dwgs...well a picture tells a 1,000 stories as they say.

 

 

Yes, I'd like to turn off the highlight feature as well as the white background.

[f700es]

Window tool in BricsCAD shape....

 

 

SO. MUCH. BETTER. THAN. SU right out of the box. Now there are some pretty great window tools from 3rd party developers out there but this is pretty slick!

[Dana W]

I have been playing around with Shape for a few hours, and I am pretty impressed with it. It is pretty easy if one already understands the terminology. Shape is apparently aimed at moderate plus experienced users, so that is not an issue, here at least.

 

Having said that last bit...

 

Shape helped me inadvertently failure test my on board graphics processor. I was going to try and extrude the walls on a 2D floorplan I drew a couple of years ago up to 97". What I did not know was that somehow Shape had turned what had been the imaginary floor itself into a surface, or face, or whatever the 3D word is for an extrudable object. At least I don't remember drawing a closed pline all the way around most of the floor area, including the half open doors.

 

When I selected the inside line of a wall, that unknown edge of the floor got selected instead. So I pulled up on it to see what would happen. After about 24" the screen refresh bagan to ratchet and stutter. At 4 feet or so the whole thing became unresponsive and never did come back. After about 20 minutes, I just Task Manager'ed it.

 

It was interesting to see the negative space floor plan, open doors and all, still at zero Z, with the floor surface extruded to about 48" Z and chocolate brown. I should have taken a screen shot but did not.

 

I might have expected to find a teenie weenie Black Hole where my itsy bitsy graphics chip used to be on the motherboard but it was ok. It merely suffered a little bit of temporary fullness.

 

The crash is no fault of BricsCAD at all, of course. It was me trying to run a 3D program with below minimum computer resources and then accidentally creating about an 800 cubic yard concrete slab with 40 or so sides.

 

I'm going to go back in a while to try and figure out why I was able to extrude (pull) the floor up even though it was never actually drawn as a closed object.

[steven-g]

It's calle AI and is one of the strong points in Shape and Bricscad it "recognises" things to save you having to draw everything, in shape you can choose whether it does this or just select edges of faces by using a combination of Ctrl and shift keys (this definately is a must to learn), and then something called the manipulator which is a bit like the UCS but on steroids

[f700es]

I did a simple test with a 8'x16' closed polyline and then offset it 3.5" inward. Shape was able to extrude both closed polylines as well as the implied space between them. So I could have had either 2 solid cubes or a extruded wall area.

[Dana W]

It's calle AI and is one of the strong points in Shape and Bricscad it "recognises" things to save you having to draw everything, in shape you can choose whether it does this or just select edges of faces by using a combination of Ctrl and shift keys (this definately is a must to learn), and then something called the manipulator which is a bit like the UCS but on steroids

OK, then it isn't something I did. I guess ctrl+shift is sort of like selection cycling.

[Dana W]

I did a simple test with a 8'x16' closed polyline and then offset it 3.5" inward. Shape was able to extrude both closed polylines as well as the implied space between them. So I could have had either 2 solid cubes or a extruded wall area.

My floor area is 90' x 98'. Thatsa whole lotta cubic. But it was sorta weirdly intriguing as a shape. At least I know how to avoid it now.