CADventory is a Qt desktop application for indexing and organizing large CAD model libraries and their associated files without requiring a heavyweight PDM deployment.

It is aimed at BRL-CAD-centric and analysis-oriented workflows where individuals and teams need to work against existing filesystem-based repositories, preserve local or offline deployment options, and build useful metadata, reporting, and discovery layers on top of those repositories.

Project Status

CADventory is currently in a prototype-to-MVP transition.

Product and architecture overview: doc/CADventory.docx
AI-assisted tagging is experimental and is still being hardened

Wireframes

These are early CADventory wireframes from the design package, included to give the repository a project-specific visual overview while the implementation continues to evolve.

What CADventory Is Trying To Do

index existing CAD model repositories in place instead of requiring a new enterprise PDM stack
track model metadata, tags, related files, and reportable inventory information
support desktop deployment patterns that fit constrained, offline, or policy-limited environments
provide a practical discovery and reporting layer for large geometry and associated-data collections

Build Requirements

CMake 3.25 or newer
C++17 compiler
Qt 6
SQLite The project can use bundled SQLite by default, or a system SQLite configuration
BRL-CAD, with BRLCAD_ROOT pointing to a built or installed tree

Important:

CADventory currently expects find_package(BRLCAD) to resolve BRL-CAD libraries
CADventory also checks for mged, rt, and gist under ${BRLCAD_ROOT}/bin
if the BRL-CAD tree exports a Qt package under lib/cmake/Qt6, CADventory uses it automatically so BRL-CAD plugins and CADventory load the same Qt runtime
otherwise, set Qt6_DIR to the Qt installation used to build BRL-CAD

Build

cmake -S . -B build-release \
  -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release \
  -DBRLCAD_ROOT=/path/to/brlcad/install-or-build-root

cmake --build build-release
cmake --install build-release --prefix ./install

Notes:

CADVENTORY_WITH_GUI=ON is the default, i.e., GUI mode is the default.
if you want a headless-only build, configure with -DCADVENTORY_WITH_GUI=OFF
if you are using a multi-config generator on Windows, add --config Release to build and install commands

Running

After install, the executable is typically:

macOS/Linux: ./install/bin/cadventory
Windows: .\install\bin\cadventory.exe

The currently supported command-line options are:

--index /path/to/library Run library indexing in CLI mode
--worker /path/to/library Run the background worker in CLI mode
--report /path/to/library Recursively discover and process BRL-CAD .g files, render geometry previews, and assemble a PDF without opening the GUI. Report metadata and renderer scratch files use a temporary workspace, so existing library metadata is not reset or modified.
-o, --output /path/to/report.pdf Set the output path for --report
--depth N Set the initial report scan depth; the scan automatically deepens when needed
--no-tags Skip optional AI tagging during report generation
--reset Clear CADventory settings and reset the model database state
-j, --num-cpus Set the worker thread count
-t, --timeout Set the worker timeout value in seconds
-v Increase logging verbosity. The logger also supports stacked flags such as -vv

Example:

./install/bin/cadventory --index /path/to/library -v

Generate a folder inventory PDF:

./install/bin/cadventory \
  --report /path/to/library \
  --output /path/to/model-inventory.pdf \
  --no-tags

AI Tagging

CADventory includes an experimental AI-assisted tagging path built around Ollama and a local model such as llama3.

Configuration:

In Settings, optionally set the path to the Ollama executable; leave it blank to discover ollama from PATH.
Select an installed local model (the default is llama3).
Start the Ollama service separately and install the selected model yourself, for example ollama pull llama3.

CADventory does not start an Ollama daemon or download models automatically. If tagging cannot run, it identifies whether the executable, service, or selected model is unavailable; a failed file is skipped so the remaining batch can continue.

Testing

cmake -S . -B build-debug \
  -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Debug \
  -DBRLCAD_ROOT=/path/to/brlcad/install-or-build-root

cmake --build build-debug --parallel
ctest --test-dir build-debug -L headless -LE "smoke|performance" --output-on-failure
ctest --test-dir build-debug -L gui --output-on-failure
ctest --test-dir build-debug -L performance --output-on-failure
ctest --test-dir build-debug -L smoke --output-on-failure

Tests link the same cadventory_domain and cadventory_application libraries as the executable. Use CADVENTORY_BUILD_TESTS=OFF for an application-only build, CADVENTORY_ENABLE_SANITIZERS=ON for AddressSanitizer and UBSan, or CADVENTORY_ENABLE_COVERAGE=ON for compiler coverage instrumentation. Coverage and sanitizers require separate build directories.

Additional Documentation

Product and design overview: doc/CADventory.docx
Distributed job queue notes: doc/CADVentory_Distributed_Job_Queue.docx

Contributing

Contribution guidance lives in CONTRIBUTING.md.

License

MIT