Publications
JIPCAD builds upon decades of research in procedural modeling and interactive CAD systems. The documentation and design of this tool draw from academic publications, technical reports, and the foundational work of the UC Berkeley geometry group. Below we highlight the key publications and resources that have shaped JIPCAD's development.
Tech Reports
The JIPCAD project has produced a series of technical reports documenting the evolution of the tool and its capabilities. Each report captures the state of development at a given point in time, covering advances in the shape description language, graphical editing features, and the underlying mesh representation. These reports serve as both historical records and reference material for understanding JIPCAD's design decisions.
Tech Report 1
Joining Interactive Graphics and Procedural Modeling for Precise Free-Form Designs — Randy Fan, UCB/EECS-2021-125, May 2021 (advisor: Carlo H. Séquin).
This report surveys JIPCAD as a joint interactive–procedural CAD tool: users author geometry with a shape description language, edit scenes in the GUI, and save changes back into reusable source so reopening the file restores the latest graphical state. It covers progress on the language and editor over the preceding year, including progressive sweeps along arbitrary 3D curves, dynamic scenes, torus generators, error handling, graphical editing and save workflows, and advanced rendering.
Tech Report 2
Versatile Geometrical Sweeps — Monica Tang and Carlo H. Séquin, UCB/EECS-2024-13, March 2024.
This report describes a sweep generator that generalizes basic geometrical extrusion: a 2D cross-section travels along a complex 3D space curve, and along the way it can be rotated, scaled non-uniformly, or morphed into other profiles. Such sweeps underpin the construction of many intricate free-form shapes.
Tech Report 3
JIPCAD_2025: Merging, Subdivision, Offsetting, and Normal-Vector Visualization — M. Chow, R. Meli, K. Qin, B. Smothers, and C.H. Séquin, EECS, University of California, Berkeley, 2025.
This report documents the latest enhancements to JIPCAD. It introduces new in-code generators for merging composite polyhedral geometries into clean boundary representations with joined vertices, for subdividing such geometries into smoother shapes using the Catmull-Clark algorithm, and for offsetting thin mathematical surfaces into thicker, 3D-printable membranes with an optional gridding option. Color preservation through all of these operations is a key improvement over prior versions. Additional contributions include an improved sphere generator with topology-type controls, normal-vector visualization generators (face normals and vertex normals), and a flexible file-import mechanism for reusing common code segments stored locally or on GitHub.
Additional Resources
For further reading, we recommend exploring the JIPCAD GitHub repository, the Example Files, and the Editor's Wiki. The project is supervised by UC Berkeley professor Carlo H. Séquin.