io.github.sandraschi/qcad-mcp

QCAD MCP

AI-driven 2D CAD automation — DXF/DWG parsing, 3D extrusion, persistent file depot, room analysis, and full CRUD management. 12 MCP tools (8 portmanteaus + 4 Prefab cards) for DXF processing. Your AI assistant becomes a QCAD Pro operator.

MCP Tools

v0.5.0 portmanteau surface: each tool takes an op discriminator plus the op's parameters (old per-op names survive only as webapp-internal aliases).

Fleet Crossconnects (Companions)

qcad-mcp works completely standalone. You can optionally connect it with companion servers in the sandraschi fleet to unlock extended features:

Self-Contained Companions: Fleet companions operate independently. Installing companions does not trigger transitive dependency chains.

CAD Depot (Persistent File Storage)

All CAD files are stored in a persistent depot at %LOCALAPPDATA%\qcad-mcp\depot — survives server restarts and system reboots. Configurable via QCAD_MCP_DEPOT env var.

Depot CRUD via REST API:

REST API

Webapp Pages

Quick Start

just bootstrap   # uv sync + bun install
start.ps1        # kills zombies, starts backend + frontend, opens browser

Install (Claude Desktop, Windows)

irm https://github.com/sandraschi/qcad-mcp/releases/latest/download/install.ps1 | iex

Installs the stable qcad-mcp.mcpb bundle into Claude Desktop. Other clients (Cursor, VS Code, OpenCode): use uvx with the stdio entry:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "qcad-mcp": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": ["run", "--directory", "D:\\Dev\\repos\\qcad-mcp", "run_server.py"]
    }
  }
}

MCP Client Config

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "qcad": {
      "url": "http://localhost:11966/sse",
      "transport": "sse"
    }
  }
}

Raster → DXF Pipeline (Planned)

Scanning a floorplan print into a working DXF is straightforward:

Book/magazine page → scanner (300-600 DPI)          inkscape-mcp
                         ↓                          (Trace Bitmap)
                    Potrace / Inkscape                    ↓
                         ↓                          QCAD MCP
                    Raw vector DXF                    (plan_edit(op="modify"))
                         ↓
                    Clean up in QCAD / plan_edit(op="modify")

Two approaches:

1. inkscape-mcp route — send the scanned PNG to inkscape-mcp's trace_bitmap() tool, get back SVG with proper path geometry. The SVG imports cleanly into QCAD as workable entities.
2. potrace in qcad-mcp — add a plan_raster_to_dxf(file_name) tool that wraps potrace + ezdxf. Self-contained, no external server needed.

Either way, the result goes through plan_edit(op="modify") for cleanup (delete noise, merge wall segments, re-assign layers, re-add dimensions). The baroque church preset in the Demo page proves the parametric geometry works — scanning would let you capture actual existing buildings.

QCAD Pro Pricing — €50? Really?

QCAD Professional sells for €50.40 for a single-user license — lifetime, no subscription. That looks absurd next to AutoCAD at $2,000+/year, but RibbonSoft's revenue model is more nuanced:

The strategy is open-core freemium with enterprise site-license extraction:

1. Community Edition is genuinely free and capable (GPLv3). It's a giant funnel — architects, makers, and students learn on it, recommend it, and eventually their employer buys a site license.
2. €50 individual is friction-free "impulse buy" pricing — no PO approval needed, no vendor negotiation. You just buy it.
3. Site & server licenses (€440–€1,771) are where the real revenue lives. An architecture firm with 20 seats paying €440 beats 200 individuals paying €50. And server licenses for SaaS/on-prem deployment scale further.
4. QCAD/CAM at €132 captures the CNC/manufacturing niche — a separate, higher-value market.
5. Books at €40 are pure margin — the manual is already written, printing costs are negligible.

RibbonSoft is a Swiss GmbH (limited company) based in Sarnen, not retirees. 100% of their office energy is from Swiss hydropower (they're proud enough to put it in the footer). They've been doing this since 1999 — 26+ years of sustainable bootstrapping.

Who pays? Ganesh in Bangalore runs the Community Edition for his residential projects — it handles DXF perfectly for Indian building code drawings. When a client demands DWG or PDF export, he drops €50 on Pro — one job pays for it. As his practice scales past 5 seats, he graduates to a site license. Meanwhile a European architecture firm pays €440 for compliance reasons and never thinks twice. The Bay Area Autodesk tax ($2,500+/year) only makes sense when someone else is paying.

€50 clears every threshold, everywhere. No PO approval, no vendor negotiation, no subscription clock. You buy it once and own it.

Quality Stack

• Python: Ruff linter + format, Pyright typecheck (0 errors) — src/ + run_server.py
• Frontend: Biome + tsc --noEmit + bun lockfile — 22 TypeScript pages
• Protocol: FastMCP 3.4 (stdio + HTTP /mcp) + 40 REST routes
• Tools: 12 MCP tools (8 portmanteaus + 4 Prefab cards) with READ_ONLY/MUTATING annotations
• Automation: Justfile recipes for all fleet operations
• Tests: pytest (78+) + Playwright e2e specs

License

MIT — see LICENSE.