cadcraft/ROADMAP.md

CADCraft roadmap

Status as of 2026-10-07. CADCraft targets full parity with AutoCAD (2D drafting first, then annotation, layouts and plotting, DWG, parametrics and 3D), plus things AutoCAD doesn't have: agent control over MCP, a scriptable CLI, a web build and a free licence.

At a glance

Question	Answer
How close is an alpha?	≈ 75% of the way. About 50 Opus 5.5 wall-clock hours remain (≈ 15–20 hours elapsed with 3–4 agents in parallel).
How far is 100% AutoCAD parity?	≈ 29% parity overall (weighted by how much each area matters). About 570 Opus 5.5 wall-clock hours remain (≈ 150–190 hours elapsed in parallel).
2D drafting parity (what most AutoCAD users do every day: M1–M8)	≈ 55%. About 245 hours remain.
The biggest single gap	3D modelling (M11): solids, surfaces, meshes, visual styles and rendering — ≈ 200 hours on its own.

What "alpha" means here

A person can do real 2D drafting work in CADCraft and trust it with their files:

• Installable, signed builds for macOS, Windows, Linux, FreeBSD and the web from the release pipeline.
• Drawings from AutoCAD open correctly, and CADCraft's DXF/DWG files open cleanly in AutoCAD and other readers.
• Every common 2D draw, modify, annotate, layer, block, layout and plot command works, both with the mouse and at the command line.
• No crashes and no lost work: autosave and recovery, plus undo that always works.

Alpha checklist

Item	State	Hours left
2D draw and modify commands, snaps, tracking, grips	done (minor options missing)	—
Dimensions, text, MTEXT, leaders, tables, TrueType fonts	done	—
Hatch with pick points, blocks, attributes	done	—
Layouts, viewports, MSPACE/PSPACE, page setup, PLOT to PDF	done	—
Parametric constraints, constraint bars and dimensional constraints on the canvas, Parameters Manager	done	—
DXF/DWG round trip of everything above	done for our data; MULTILEADER is written as LEADER + MTEXT; *D dimension blocks duplicate on re-save	6
Confirmed opening in AutoCAD (black-box check)	not yet confirmed	4
Layer Properties Manager (VP overrides, states, filters), QSELECT, Quick Properties	done	—
Autosave, crash recovery, RECOVER/AUDIT	partial	6
Options dialog and preferences	partial	6
Plot preview	missing	4
Scripted smoke test of all 290 commands through the UI, then fixing what it finds	not started	12
Release pipeline: first green signed build on every platform	workflows written; first run being started	6
Getting-started docs and the web build hosted	partial	4
Total		≈ 50

Where we are

Measure	Value
Menu breadth (cargo xtask parity, docs/parity.md)	233 / 491 reference menu items (47%)
Registered commands	290 (133 with interactive prompts)
Estimated overall feature parity (weighted by how much each area matters)	≈ 29%
Performance	200k entities: pick 0.001 ms, pick after an edit ≈ 4 ms (incremental R-tree), GPU canvas ≈ 4 ms per frame
Tests	geometry, colour, document, fonts, render, DXF/DWG round trips, constraints solver, engine (commands, prompts, snaps, selection, undo, scripts, hostile input), MCP agent tasks, xtask
Gates	cargo xtask ci: fmt, clippy -D warnings, tests, asset attribution, layering, wasm — green

Menu breadth counts menu items that exist; the weighted parity estimate also counts depth (options, edge cases, dialogs), which is why it is lower.

Milestones

#	Milestone	Status	Estimate (Opus 5.5 wall-clock hours)
M0	Skeleton + vertical slice: workspace, AutoCAD-style UI, command line, draw/modify basics, DXF, CLI, MCP, web	done	—
M1	Drafting core: every Draw-menu 2D command and option, dynamic input fields, object snap tracking, temporary snap overrides	~85% (all 2D Draw items exist)	8
M2	Modify: grips (stretch/move/rotate/scale/mirror, multifunctional), PEDIT, SPLINEDIT, LENGTHEN, BLEND, ALIGN, associative arrays, trim/extend for all curve types, MATCHPROP UI, Quick Properties	~65% (PEDIT, LENGTHEN, ALIGN, BLEND, grips API, TRIM on splines)	18
M3	Layers & properties: full Layer Properties Manager (filters, VP overrides, states), linetype manager, lineweight display, transparency, QSELECT dialog, Properties for every object type	~75% (Layer Properties Manager with VP overrides/states/filters, QSELECT, Quick Properties)	10
M4	Annotation: DIM* commands, DIMSTYLE manager, associative dimensions, MLEADER + styles, in-place MTEXT editor, fields, tables + table styles, annotative scaling, TrueType fonts, SHX reader	~50% (TrueType text, MTEXT formatting codes, full DIMSTYLE variables + overrides, all arrowheads, associative dimensions, TABLE editing; DXF round trip; not yet: native MULTILEADER objects, jogged/ordinate polish, tolerance frames, fields, annotative scaling, SHX)	30
M5	Hatch & blocks: pick-point boundary detection, islands, gradients, BLOCK/WBLOCK/INSERT dialogs, attributes (ATTDEF/ATTEDIT/BATTMAN), block editor, dynamic block parameters, xrefs, groups, Blocks palette	~35% (pick-point boundaries with islands, gradients, BLOCK/INSERT, attributes, nested blocks)	70
M6	Layouts & plotting: paper space, viewports (rect/polygonal/object, scale, lock, per-VP layers), page setups, PLOT to PDF/PNG/SVG, plot styles (CTB/STB), PUBLISH	~55% (layouts, viewports, MSPACE/PSPACE through viewports, page setup, PLOT/EXPORTPDF)	25
M7	Files: DWG read/write (done via acadrust), DXF fidelity (all object types, round-trip of unknown data), RECOVER/AUDIT, PURGE, templates, autosave, ETRANSMIT, PDF/raster underlays	~55% (DXF round trip of dimension styles, associativity, tables and constraints)	55
M8	Inquiry & utilities: MEASUREGEOM, MASSPROP, QuickCalc, Find/Replace, spell check, COUNT, DWG Compare, Settings/OPTIONS, CUI-style customisation, alias editor	~20%	30
M9	Parametric: geometric + dimensional constraints, AutoConstrain, Parameters Manager (constraint solver, see plan/adr/0001)	~60% (own solver crate, all GC*/DC* commands, AUTOCONSTRAIN, PARAMETERS, conflict detection, re-solve after edits, DXF persistence; not yet: inference while drawing, Smooth as true G2)	12
M10	Performance: GPU canvas (wgpu batches), R-tree spatial index, incremental regen, 1M-entity drawings at 60 fps	~70% (GPU canvas, incremental R-tree: pick 50 ms → 0.001 ms at 200k entities, ≈ 4 ms after an edit)	12
M11	3D: UCS, orbit, visual styles, solids (box…loft, booleans, fillet edges), meshes, surfaces, sections, rendering	0%	200
M12	Automation: an embedded safe AutoLISP-compatible interpreter, action recorder, sheet sets, CLI/MCP parity tests	~25%	60
M13	1.0 polish: preferences, workspaces, themes, localisation, accessibility, signed packages for every platform, docs	~10%	40
	Remaining total		≈ 570 hours

At roughly 570 more hours of Opus 5.5 wall-clock work (with parallel agents this compresses to about 150–190 hours of elapsed time), CADCraft would reach broad AutoCAD parity. 2D drafting parity (M1–M8) is the first ≈ 250 hours.

Current focus

1. Finish the alpha checklist above (release builds, AutoCAD open check, smoke test of every command, autosave/recovery, plot preview).
2. Layer filter groups, constraint bar polish (close buttons, hover highlight).
3. Native MULTILEADER objects in DXF; stop *D block duplication on re-save.
4. Then 3D foundations (UCS, orbit, solids via truck/csgrs per plan/adr/0001).