QCad - LibreCAD's "parent" in 'portable' format - 32- & 64-bit

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mikewalsh
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QCad - LibreCAD's "parent" in 'portable' format - 32- & 64-bit

Post by mikewalsh »

Morning, gang.

As 2D CAD applications go, LibreCAD has for long enough been seen as the Linux 'gold' standard. It's not an easy one to get complete, ready-to-go packages for though, since it's either download from a repo and hope to hell it grabs all the dependencies, or download source code and compile it yourself.

I like FreeCAD, though it's primarily for 3D 'parametric' CAD modelling; it has very limited straight-forward 2D capability, which I think of more as 'normal' CAD usage.

So.....enter QCad.

https://qcad.org/en/

This is the original app from which LibreCAD was forked around a decade ago.

I've been using this for at least a couple of years. It's on a par with LibreCAD; it looks pretty much the same, the functionality is almost identical. More importantly, however, it's much more accessible; the download page offers several different downloads for both arches. There's a Qt5 tarball; a Qt4 tarball; an "installer".

I'm a bit wary of "installers".....I've had a few major cock-ups with these in Puppy, so wherever possible I prefer a tarball with a totally self-contained directory.....everything needed to run. And this what you get with the Qt tarballs; here, I've selected the Qt4 variants.....it's a more mature release, and more widely-supported by the vast majority of Pups. More importantly, it's a lot more forgiving, and far less "fussy" than Qt5. Or seems to be, anyroad.

This is downloaded as a 'trial' version.....but instructions are provided at first run on how to convert this to the permanent, 'free' community version, by the simple expedient of the removal of 4 plugins. Which has already been done for you.

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This is the current build - v3.26.4.0 - released back at the beginning of June this year. I've built it in my standard 'portable' format, with self-contained .config stuff that's sym-linked out to the expected location at runtime, and removed again at close. Download; unzip; put it wherever you like. There's the option to add a Menu entry from its current location; the 'MenuReadMe' explains how to do this.

There's extensive tutorials on the QCad website - https://qcad.org/en/documentation/tutorials - along with plenty of 'other' documentation for anyone who wants it.

For anyone who's interested, you can find it here:-

https://mega.nz/folder/3KQiyD6a#KcteXga1STvg3khP2IKlFQ

32- and 64-bit versions are available. Enjoy.

Mike. ;)

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Re: QCad - LibreCAD's "parent"' in 'portable' format - 32- & 64-bit

Post by mikewalsh »

New release of QCad, just 8 days ago - now at v3.27.1.

As before, these have already been converted to the permanent 'free' community version by the removal of those 4 plugins. Packed in Puppy-portable format, you can find it at the link above.

D/l; unzip; place anywhere you like, though better outside the 'save'. Click to enter, click on 'LAUNCH' to fire it up. Additional scripts permit adding a Menu entry from wherever it's been located, if required.

Enjoy.

Mike. ;)

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Re: QCad - LibreCAD's "parent" in 'portable' format - 32- & 64-bit

Post by mikewalsh »

Up-to-date build of QCad, from around 7 weeks ago. We're now at v3.28.1, and the build process has moved on from Qt4 to Qt5. As before, appears to run w/o issue, and doesn't seem to need any additional dependencies.

Enjoy.

Mike. ;)

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Re: QCad - LibreCAD's "parent" in 'portable' format - 32- & 64-bit

Post by peppyy »

@mikewalsh This seems to run great in fossapup64 from a separate partition. For me it has a steep learning curve though. I am always looking for familiar tools line the move tool in the gimp. I should probably find the man for it before I go too far. :oops: Used to be really good with a pencil, a tee square, a triangle and a drafting table.
Always appreciate these portables.
Thanks for this.

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