Architecture

OpenAEC Foundation has published an open source software ecosystem for the AEC sector, covering buildings, infrastructure, civil engineering, and site workflows. The project presents a broad catalogue of tools including Open PDF Studio, Open 2D Studio, Open CAD Studio, Open Geotechniek Studio, Monty IFC Viewer, BIM Validator, Open Energy Studio, Open Field Studio, BCF Manager Studio, and others, with source code collected under the OpenAEC Foundation GitHub organisation. ...

IFC Georeferencer is a browser-based tool for giving IFC models real-world coordinates. Developed by Bedrock.engineer for buildingSMART Nederland’s Georefereren IFC initiative, it runs client-side so IFC files are processed in the browser rather than uploaded to a server. ...

Hippo3D has its first public release as a free and open source CAD modelling plugin for Blender. The project experiments with bringing Rhino-style, command-based, and coordinate-driven modelling workflows into Blender while keeping the tools integrated with Blender’s wider ecosystem. ...

Work is underway on Bonsai Viewer, a dedicated free software IFC viewer for model coordination and review. The gap is straightforward: there is no mature free software equivalent of Revizto, BIMcollab, Solibri, and similar coordination viewers. Bonsai Viewer aims to fill that gap, while also making it easier for others to build their own desktop, tablet, kiosk, on-site screen, or web-based IFC viewer applications on top of IfcOpenShell. ...

Louis Trümpler announced that point clouds are coming to IFClite as part of the same browser-native openBIM workflow, rather than as a separate viewer or visual overlay. The first pass includes LAS / LAZ streaming, E57 / PLY / PCD readers, Web Worker decoding, WebGPU point rendering, colour modes for RGB, classification, intensity, height, and fixed colour, plus federation-aware point picking. ...

Bonsai v0.8.5 has been released with 962 new features and fixes. The release is described as a “line in the sand”: a compatibility and consolidation checkpoint driven partly by Blender 5.1 support, the move to Python 3.13, and a lot of structural work preparing for larger changes ahead. ...

Olympus has been open sourced as a toolkit for building and prototyping 3D web applications for architecture, engineering, construction, and operations. The project combines a Three.js-based 3D editor, Monaco code editor, Chart.js dashboards, undo-redo, configurable UI, and an extensible addon system. ...

Blender 5.1 has been released, with the Blender Foundation describing it as a refinement-focused update for performance and stability across the production pipeline. Cycles receives faster GPU rendering on benchmark scenes, faster CPU rendering on Windows, and shading consistency fixes, while the wider release includes hundreds of bug fixes, cleanups, and refactors. ...

Louis Trümpler announced federated loading support in IFClite, a browser-native IFC viewer and toolkit built with WebGPU and Rust/WASM. For IFC4.3 and earlier workflows, federation means loading multiple IFC models side by side with collision-safe IDs, per-model visibility, unified spatial hierarchy handling, and selection across model boundaries. ...

Bonsai v0.8.4 has been released with 1111 new features and fixes. The release brings Bonsai compatibility with Blender 5.0, which matters because Blender 5.0 is a major platform update and required compatibility work throughout the add-on. ...