[adastra22]

Or, to make a directly relevant parallel, the adoption of Blender. It used to be a niche open source tool whereas any self respecting professional used Maya or 3DS Max, and Adobe products. Now it ate the entire visual effects and video game industries.

[linkdink]

Blender provides much of the value of its competitors. A purely CAD tool does not. You have to solve the other problems primarily, while also having CAD. Otherwise, it's like having a text editor when no programming languages exist. What is your business going to do with that?

[CRConrad]

> Otherwise, it's like having a text editor when no programming languages exist.

You mean a bit like an operating system without a kernel...?

[adastra22]

I think you’re fighting a straw man? There needs to be an open-source integrated CAD/CAM environment, like Fusion 360 is. That's what the OP in this subthread is asking for.

[linkdink]

That wish is already granted

https://wiki.freecadweb.org/Path_Workbench

My thesis is that the bigger challenge is "economic", not technical.