FreeCAD 0.19

One thing I absolutely love in the Autocad version we got teached back in school was the way the selection rectangle worked.<p>Drawing the selection rectangle from left to right selects all lines fully covered by the rectangle.<p>Drawing the selecton rectangle from right to left selects all lines partially or fully covered by the rectangle.<p>(Either this, or the other way round.)<p>Does FreeCAD or any other free CAD solution support this? I can&#x27;t do without this. Which one of the free CAD solutions out there imitate Autocad 2005 the closest?

If you have &quot;rage-quit&quot; FreeCAD in the past, like I have, here are few tips to make it more palatable:<p>Install PieMenu addon<p>Install Glass addon<p>Enable TreeView<p>Make icons larger so it&#x27;s easier to tell what function they are for.

If curious, related past threads:<p><i>FreeCAD Simulator</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=25098981" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=25098981</a> - Nov 2020 (13 comments)<p><i>FreeCAD BIM development news</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=24951311" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=24951311</a> - Oct 2020 (23 comments)<p><i>FreeCAD: A free and open source multiplatform 3D parametric modeler</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=24513340" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=24513340</a> - Sept 2020 (268 comments)<p><i>A Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) workbench for FreeCAD</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=23787391" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=23787391</a> - July 2020 (4 comments)<p><i>FreeCAD on Raspberry Pi 4</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=22347385" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=22347385</a> - Feb 2020 (36 comments)<p><i>Parametric CAD modeling for open source scientific hardware: OpenSCAD &#x2F; FreeCAD</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=22270981" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=22270981</a> - Feb 2020 (1 comment)<p><i>FreeCAD BIM development news December 2018</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=18800484" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=18800484</a> - Jan 2019 (22 comments)<p><i>FreeCAD 0.17 “Roland” released</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=16790814" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=16790814</a> - April 2018 (58 comments)<p><i>FreeCAD Arch development news</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=14480294" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=14480294</a> - June 2017 (44 comments)<p><i>FreeCAD 0.16 release notes</i> - <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=11533435" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;news.ycombinator.com&#x2F;item?id=11533435</a> - April 2016 (75 comments)

The TechDraw improvements in this version are a big deal. They&#x27;ve made it good enough for me to make actual shop drawings with proper tolerances, section views, and so on.

How well does FreeCAD meet needs of amateur builders, tinkerers, and diy-ers? Say for example 3d printing, small home additions, etc.?

Sad to see that the (confusingly named, because they have no relationship with each other) Assembly3 vs Assembly4 split is here to stay.

I use SolidWorks on a dedicated workstation.<p>FreeCAD is far from it in terms of number of geometric tools, and especially 3D path stroking.<p>Freeform surfaces are a great pain in any CAD, but FreeCAD barely does even basics.<p>To catch up to SolidWorks, FreeCAD needs like tenfold increase in effort for the geometry kernel.