Anders Johansson

Programmer, Designer

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@ShreyashGuptas @istvan_csanady I've heard of Adam before. Yours is the first example I've heard of it being useful as more than a toy. Which did you use - CADAM or the Onshape/Fusion extensions?

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@ShreyashGuptas @istvan_csanady What text to CAD tool was this?

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@Hold_Left_Edge @davidliuxyz This sounds like a powerful combo. Any video?

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@adamdotnew This is just silly; at that point, you might as well just do regular CAD. Text to CAD at least offers non-trivial value.

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@GFaang97609 @kenwheeler Why do you automatically assume he would lie?
Nevertheless, I hope @kenwheeler does share the conversation, for everyone to learn from.

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@gak_pdx @virtualrealife Interesting. But is there any reason a CNC can't use the same tool? The massive face mill that is.

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@mattparlmer @i2cjak @genfabco "SoC ideas" - Most excited for this!

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@AWeirdPhysicist @mr_aspartame Curious - do you throw an entire PDF at it, or just a trimmed file with relevant pages (to avoid monopolizing too much of the max context length)?

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@emm0sh @carlbass @MaxLobovsky Interesting perspective; goes against everything I've believed. I'm going to try this out. ( Also came across this old writeup of yours in the meantime: https://t.co/ioRYzAt7LB )

[em m0shouris @emm0sh]

how i CAD -- engineers don't really talk about their CAD workflows much, so i thought i would spell mine out. i hope it's useful

i don't default to "parametric" (what should really be called feature based history) modeling, and i think that's ok. i think it has its place (<10% of cases imo) and i rarely think it useful in R&D or mass manufacturing. i find it's great for people who have standardized assets that follow strict rules (furniture, truss or framing companies, etc.)

i use a direct modeling approach that avoids sketching when possible. how do i do this without sketches? NX lets you generate curves without sketches. autocad and plasticity operate through this paradigm by default

i do not care about feature history length and either ignore it, or purposely use tools like remove parameters (NX) to wipe the history periodically. i never use assembly functionality or assembly constraints and all of my parts live in a single file as bodies

these files are by proxy "assemblies". i instantiate bodies within them (blocks in autocad, components in NX) when required -- i have various workflows for turning these parts into something the system can understand for drawings and PDM. those most familiar with fusion360 or NX are already aware of this paradigm

some organizations don't like this. for example, one forced feature history based models ("parametric") or models would be rejected in the ECR process

in other orgs, they've mimicked almost 100% my direct modeling workflow and it was actually frowned upon to have a feature based modeling histories. what i've learned is that for really complex assemblies, you need to not parametrically link variables that define geometry and reduce feature history as much as possible. i understand this is indirectly calling some startups out (like flow engineering), but i have not yet seen this to be untrue

why?

1. dependencies break. think of each dependency (parameter, feature, etc.) as an attack vector. native CAD files are not source code. each CAD company has created their own "source code" (features) and they do not necessarily all compile to the same result. in the software paradigm, you should actually think of BREPs (.stp exports) as the source code, and everything before that as an abstraction that could cause issues. almost every employer i've had disagrees with me on this, so if your blood is boiling, it's OK, you're not alone

2. it's fast. it doesn't matter what i started with, i don't have to think about the history of the part. if i don't like a part, i can push/pull faces and slice geometry to get what i want. the ability to totally disconnect the future state of a geometry from its previous state is, and i don't think this is an exaggeration, almost 10x faster than having to grok what you were thinking months or years ago

3. to further the point in 2 -- you can comment code. that's a reason source code can live for decades and its intent can still be understood later. you can't comment feature histories

4. if you go with the direct modeling approach, the CAD cartel loses. if you can easily export your step file, and rely on direct modeling approaches, then you're never locked into a CAD system. period. feels pretty good. by the way, this is what enables open source hardware

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@emm0sh @carlbass @MaxLobovsky How do you deal with complex design changes requiring dimension updates across parts (and assemblies) without parametrics / any form of feature-tree? Obviously you work on serious projects; I'm genuinely curious how direct modeling scales to those situations

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@ruben_kostard Pretty impressive. How reliable is it (image to model with Gemini3.1 + ForgeCAD) in your experience? Does it work for most object photos made of fairly simple geometry, like a phone or a watering can or a chair?

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@JacklouisP @Marcin_Gwozdz_ Which ones? I'm interested.

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@TheHatman9 @mpatrickwalton That must be real convenient!

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@TheHatman9 @mpatrickwalton Looked at the Trylene site. Are they fast or cheap?

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@nk Interestingly, there are reports like this about big capability leaps (though not about coding): https://t.co/MWWVXo9uEL

[Igor Babuschkin @ibab]

I’ve tested the latest generation of all the major AIs on theoretical physics research and Claude 4.6 has absolutely blown me away with how capable it is in physics. It feels like a Claude Code moment for research is not that far off.

It has a very detailed understanding of existing literature, and it’s able to do complex calculations that are several pages long, often without mistakes. It can also write amazing 20 page tutorials that help break down difficult technical topics in QFT and condensed matter physics. This is a huge difference compared to last year’s models, which would make tons of mistakes and were way too vague when you asked them to write formulas. Claude is still far (far) away from solving quantum gravity, but you can have a serious discussion with it about existing approaches and it can help you iterate faster on topics you understand well. The experience is similar to building a complex codebase with Claude Code in that you sometimes have to use your understanding to patch up some things that the model did wrong, but you end up being much faster and more confident when tackling hard problems. If you’re a physicist and don’t believe it, give it a try!

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@LOP_LWO @amyblance2000 @AntiTrumpCanada @BrandonWon2020 What in your opinion causes them to be highly racist against Blacks? I know there are tons of shitty reasons people have in general, but trying to understand how those two groups in particular (Mexican Americans &amp; immigrants) think, esp. since you said they have this in common.

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@LOP_LWO @amyblance2000 @AntiTrumpCanada @BrandonWon2020 such a complicated situation. thanks for sharing - can see why those two dudes would join ICE. Pretty depressing how the pecking order gets internalized (and then enforced horizontally).

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@LOP_LWO @amyblance2000 @AntiTrumpCanada @BrandonWon2020 Curious about this. Explain?

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@MenyJanos Nice. But how does the search in something like this even work, without any human made metadata?

[Anders Johansson @ajohansson1981]

@mignano @ennriiq I love the speed + overall organization of the content (FAQ and Quiz features are such great learning tools).

Only one, but big, dislike: The actual learning content, which is the main point of Oboe, is constrained into a quarter-screen-width sidebar. I'm on a desktop browser.