5 ms·

FreeCAD in the Browser

51 points by cui 2mo ago

techbro92 2mo ago
Why would I want to run this in the browser vs locally?
- fragmede 2mo ago
  Because then it doesn't matter what you're running locally, as long as you've got a supported browser (Chrome, I'm guessing). It means it doesn't have to make a difference if you have a Window 10 desktop or a MacBook Air or a Chromebook. Go to the web page and look at this CAD.
  - cui 2mo ago
    This. The browser as a universal platform.
    - Evidlo 2mo ago
      Like electron, but it's fine this way for some reason.
      - Leonard_of_Q 2mo ago
        It is fine 'cause it uses the browser you're already using anyway instead of importing a new one for each and every application. Run the backend on a server somewhere and you can get to your application anywhere you can reach that server which - using a self-hosted VPN - can be anywhere you have internet access.
- gkhartman 2mo ago
  Probably nice to have for those with low income that only have a Chromebook.
- SequoiaHope 2mo ago
  Browser can be local. What’s nice about browser based is that browser based programs can run on every device. Though it sounds like this one requires chrome which seems weird to me.
- devttyeu 2mo ago
  (I made this port) Fwiw I personally had no reason to do this port beyond using it as a benchmark of the agentic capability of Fable, where something of this shape is IMO a way better gauge than those dumb X.com 'I oneshot game with models X/Y/Z this is how it compares' I published the actual prompts, and you can see quite clearly that vs Opus which is ok at implementing one big feature, Fable was really able to push through a good chunk of the port. That said it definitely didn't one-shot the port, it also didn't figure out a broken docker sbx sandbox by itself, and also later needed some gaslighting into thinking that the port is not really that hard (by any human measure it was quite hard given the scope of code involved.. The nearly 200MB wasm binary is mostly code afaict..). So there are some clear patterns of how the model was trained and also roughly the scope of task visible in those traces. What I see is that it likes prompts that would take an L4/L5 2-4 weeks to do with Cursor ~2 years ago, more needs some direction and deliberate prompting.
deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]
s1mon 2mo ago
Onshape is free in the browser as long as you are not doing commercial work. It’s a professional system from the founders of Solidworks that competes with all the top CAD tools.
- throwup238 2mo ago
  > It’s a professional system from the founders of Solidworks that competes with all the top CAD tools. Because it's built on Parasolid, the same geometric kernel as everyone else. With ACIS pretty much out the door, almost all the professional CAD packages are just window dressing on the same CG implementation.
  - SequoiaHope 2mo ago
    Agreed. I’m not OP but for six months I’ve been using Claude to build a from-scratch CAD kernel based on Rust and WASM, MIT licensed. The actual UI still needs a lot of work, but I’ve been focused on the kernel. Fable has helped a lot though Opus was already making great headway. I’m an OnShape power user going back about ten years, Solidworks before that. I need a CAD system that absolutely works. There is a lot of work to do still, and it still seems impossible to succeed, but I’ve been very happy with where things have been going with it lately. It’s serverless, local, and browser based. You can load the latest binary from GitHub pages here: https://sequoia-hope.github.io/waffle-iron/ https://sequoia-hope.github.io/waffle-iron/ Click the Assay menu to see the kernel test cases we’ve been using so far. Rapidly closing on 100% support!
    - 27183 2mo ago
      > It’s serverless, local, and browser based. uhh what..
      - SequoiaHope 2mo ago
        The app consists of a wasm (web assembly) binary and JavaScript. The wasm runs locally on your machine in your browser and communicates with the JavaScript frontend. There is no backend server to handle any part of the program. The URL just loads the binary in to your local browser. I don’t know exactly how one would set this up but this would work for example fully offline. The browser basically just becomes a universal compute and rendering engine for it.
dd8601fn 2mo ago
Sounds cool. Doesn't work.
- cui 2mo ago
  Seems it's only supporting Chrome at the moment.
- devttyeu 2mo ago
  Author of the port here, you need a browser with JSPI support, which means recent Chrome, or Firefox Nightly with the feature flag flipped, or Firefox from the future.
  - devttyeu 2mo ago
    I will also note that it's possible to compile this with wasm asyncify, but the result iirc is a ~400MiB Wasm binary that will crash the browser tab before you will be able to do anything useful in it.
ebspelman 2mo ago
The launch graphic says "Ported end-to-end by Fable, an AI agent" and it definitely feels that way. Buggy, glitchy, needs some love and human eyes before it's really usable.
- NavinF 2mo ago
  FreeCAD on desktop is much the same in my experience. If LLMs were mainstream a few years ago I would have assumed the UI was 100% AI generated with zero human input besides a oneshot prompt.
  - cui 2mo ago
    If Solidworks and Onshape were born after the birth of LLMs, they'd probably be glitchy as hell.
  - gucci-on-fleek 2mo ago
    When was the last time that you used FreeCAD? Even 18 months ago, I would agree with you that it was a buggy mess, but I tried it a few weeks ago and it was super stable. The UI is still a little confusing, but that just comes with the domain, since AutoCAD and Fusion 360 aren't much better.
    - jazzyjackson 2mo ago
      I couldn’t get the results described by the intro tutorial 3 months ago, in the parts bench drawing a polygon, snapping was broken.
dang 2mo ago
Recent and related: LibreCAD in the Browser - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48755075 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48755075 - July 2026 (17 comments)
emmelaich 2mo ago
Amazing. How much did it cost?
- deleted 2mo ago
  [deleted]
- devttyeu 2mo ago
  I made the port, roughly ~one maxed out Claude Max 20x sub, at the bottom of the article I've shared the full claude code transcripts, so you can probably to some rough math on token usage with that. Edit: to be precise 'maxed out' means one weekly limit on fable used over those 4 days

51 points by cui 2mo ago

techbro92 2mo ago

Why would I want to run this in the browser vs locally?

fragmede 2mo ago
Because then it doesn't matter what you're running locally, as long as you've got a supported browser (Chrome, I'm guessing). It means it doesn't have to make a difference if you have a Window 10 desktop or a MacBook Air or a Chromebook. Go to the web page and look at this CAD.
- cui 2mo ago
  This. The browser as a universal platform.
  - Evidlo 2mo ago
    Like electron, but it's fine this way for some reason.
    - Leonard_of_Q 2mo ago
      It is fine 'cause it uses the browser you're already using anyway instead of importing a new one for each and every application. Run the backend on a server somewhere and you can get to your application anywhere you can reach that server which - using a self-hosted VPN - can be anywhere you have internet access.
gkhartman 2mo ago
Probably nice to have for those with low income that only have a Chromebook.
SequoiaHope 2mo ago
Browser can be local. What’s nice about browser based is that browser based programs can run on every device. Though it sounds like this one requires chrome which seems weird to me.
devttyeu 2mo ago
(I made this port) Fwiw I personally had no reason to do this port beyond using it as a benchmark of the agentic capability of Fable, where something of this shape is IMO a way better gauge than those dumb X.com 'I oneshot game with models X/Y/Z this is how it compares' I published the actual prompts, and you can see quite clearly that vs Opus which is ok at implementing one big feature, Fable was really able to push through a good chunk of the port. That said it definitely didn't one-shot the port, it also didn't figure out a broken docker sbx sandbox by itself, and also later needed some gaslighting into thinking that the port is not really that hard (by any human measure it was quite hard given the scope of code involved.. The nearly 200MB wasm binary is mostly code afaict..). So there are some clear patterns of how the model was trained and also roughly the scope of task visible in those traces. What I see is that it likes prompts that would take an L4/L5 2-4 weeks to do with Cursor ~2 years ago, more needs some direction and deliberate prompting.

deleted 2mo ago

[deleted]

s1mon 2mo ago

Onshape is free in the browser as long as you are not doing commercial work. It’s a professional system from the founders of Solidworks that competes with all the top CAD tools.

throwup238 2mo ago
> It’s a professional system from the founders of Solidworks that competes with all the top CAD tools. Because it's built on Parasolid, the same geometric kernel as everyone else. With ACIS pretty much out the door, almost all the professional CAD packages are just window dressing on the same CG implementation.
- SequoiaHope 2mo ago
  Agreed. I’m not OP but for six months I’ve been using Claude to build a from-scratch CAD kernel based on Rust and WASM, MIT licensed. The actual UI still needs a lot of work, but I’ve been focused on the kernel. Fable has helped a lot though Opus was already making great headway. I’m an OnShape power user going back about ten years, Solidworks before that. I need a CAD system that absolutely works. There is a lot of work to do still, and it still seems impossible to succeed, but I’ve been very happy with where things have been going with it lately. It’s serverless, local, and browser based. You can load the latest binary from GitHub pages here: https://sequoia-hope.github.io/waffle-iron/ https://sequoia-hope.github.io/waffle-iron/ Click the Assay menu to see the kernel test cases we’ve been using so far. Rapidly closing on 100% support!
  - 27183 2mo ago
    > It’s serverless, local, and browser based. uhh what..
    - SequoiaHope 2mo ago
      The app consists of a wasm (web assembly) binary and JavaScript. The wasm runs locally on your machine in your browser and communicates with the JavaScript frontend. There is no backend server to handle any part of the program. The URL just loads the binary in to your local browser. I don’t know exactly how one would set this up but this would work for example fully offline. The browser basically just becomes a universal compute and rendering engine for it.

dd8601fn 2mo ago

Sounds cool. Doesn't work.

cui 2mo ago
Seems it's only supporting Chrome at the moment.
devttyeu 2mo ago
Author of the port here, you need a browser with JSPI support, which means recent Chrome, or Firefox Nightly with the feature flag flipped, or Firefox from the future.
- devttyeu 2mo ago
  I will also note that it's possible to compile this with wasm asyncify, but the result iirc is a ~400MiB Wasm binary that will crash the browser tab before you will be able to do anything useful in it.

ebspelman 2mo ago

The launch graphic says "Ported end-to-end by Fable, an AI agent" and it definitely feels that way. Buggy, glitchy, needs some love and human eyes before it's really usable.

NavinF 2mo ago
FreeCAD on desktop is much the same in my experience. If LLMs were mainstream a few years ago I would have assumed the UI was 100% AI generated with zero human input besides a oneshot prompt.
- cui 2mo ago
  If Solidworks and Onshape were born after the birth of LLMs, they'd probably be glitchy as hell.
- gucci-on-fleek 2mo ago
  When was the last time that you used FreeCAD? Even 18 months ago, I would agree with you that it was a buggy mess, but I tried it a few weeks ago and it was super stable. The UI is still a little confusing, but that just comes with the domain, since AutoCAD and Fusion 360 aren't much better.
  - jazzyjackson 2mo ago
    I couldn’t get the results described by the intro tutorial 3 months ago, in the parts bench drawing a polygon, snapping was broken.

dang 2mo ago

Recent and related: LibreCAD in the Browser - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48755075 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48755075 - July 2026 (17 comments)

emmelaich 2mo ago

Amazing. How much did it cost?

deleted 2mo ago
[deleted]
devttyeu 2mo ago
I made the port, roughly ~one maxed out Claude Max 20x sub, at the bottom of the article I've shared the full claude code transcripts, so you can probably to some rough math on token usage with that. Edit: to be precise 'maxed out' means one weekly limit on fable used over those 4 days