CAD VIZid Bridge

The CAD VIZid Bridge plug-ins connect a running CAD application directly to VIZid Suite. Each plug-in streams the active part or assembly over a TCP link to VIZid Mesh, which tessellates the geometry and places it in the scene as the CAD model changes.

Two plug-ins are available, one per supported CAD application:

Both speak the same wire protocol to the same VIZid Bridge server embedded in VIZid Mesh, so the workflow is identical regardless of which CAD application is used.

How It Works

VIZid Suite hosts the VIZid Bridge server; the CAD plug-in connects to it as a client over TCP. When the plug-in connects, it walks the CAD assembly and exports each part as an exact STEP file, attaching the part’s transform, colour and a content hash. The whole scene is sent in one message, after which the plug-in sends only the parts that have changed.

VIZid Mesh receives each part, tessellates it at its resolved quality, and builds the assembly hierarchy in the scene. No geometry is meshed on the CAD side and no separate middleware process is involved: the plug-in talks straight to the server in VIZid Mesh.

The server side of VIZid Bridge – starting the server, the host and port settings, and how received parts are handled – is documented in VIZid Bridge.

Requirements

  • A 64-bit Windows machine running the supported CAD application. Install each plug-in only on the machine that runs the corresponding CAD application.

  • VIZid Suite, with the VIZid Mesh VIZid Bridge server started.

  • A TCP route between the two: when the CAD application and VIZid Suite run on the same machine, the default host 127.0.0.1 and port 8765 work with no further setup.

The per-application requirements and install steps are covered on each plug-in’s page.