Mac OS X woodworking software

I've used the generic, open-source cad software QCad a few times for my woodworking projects. It's just 2D and the interface leaves a little to be desired, but if you figure out all the controls it does a decent job. It's available for OSX, as well as Windows and Linux. The most recent version is pay-ware, but there is a perfectly reasonable older version that can be had for free from sourceforge:

Gerry

not necessarily what you want or may need. In many cases what you get can be lacking in usability, and features.

I'm sure that if you compare your OS stuff to the App I posted, you'd be better off paying for something.

I'd even bet that you didn't look at the link and just went to OS land with your free stuff.

Many, but not all or even most. Open-source software is some of the best options out there, almost in every category.

That's a blanket statement that is rarely justified.

Why the attitude, Jim? Threatened by open source as a concept, perhaps? Dismissing open source as "junk because it's free" (which seems to be your point) is simplistic at best, and usually wrong.

Dave Hinz

I develop commercial and shareware software myself, so I have a good idea how much work it takes to make a good software package. I'm continually impressed with the level of effort people expend on open-source projects, that they create with huge amounts of their own time and then give away to anyone who asks. You are right that a lot of the free stuff out there is a little lacking, and sometimes it seems like the developers quit before the program is really finished or polished. That said, there are definately exceptions to that rule that I use on a daily basis (linux kernel, apache, perl, GNU utilities, latex, graphviz, etc.) which are equal to or superior than their commercial counterparts. If anything, they tend to have more features than commercial software (and this can be a bad thing), if only because any random person can add their favorite thing without going through committee.

I did follow your link, however. Design Intuition actually looks quite nice, and I'm glad to see something like that available for the Mac. I just wish I could afford it. I'm certain it is better than QCad, but as a WW woodworker I can't justify spending that kind of money. I use QCad because I haven't found anything better within my extremely limited price range.

I'm assuming the FreeBSD version is the one that works best on OS X. I seem to recall that is what the kernal is built upon. Please confirm.

thanks

You want one of the builds distributed as a .dmg file. Try qcad-1.5.4-2.dmg, which contains an OSX installer package.

You should be able to just download, uncompress, untar, and build it from the source, which I would think would be OS-agnostic?

email me if you run into problems, I could use a CAD program and I'd be happy to send you my install notes once I do it.

Dave

OS X uses the Mach kernel. The BSD subsytem is an optional install (though it probably shouldn't be optional).

djb