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What is a Geometry Kernel? C3D vs ACIS vs Parasolid

What is a Geometry Kernel? C3D vs ACIS vs Parasolid

nickkallen1
3 HN recommenders · discussed 2023–2025
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About this video

The Plasticity creator explains what a geometry kernel is and compares commercial options C3D, ACIS, and Parasolid, describing his months of research and why he chose as he did.

Why it appears in the archive

Cited in CAD threads as a rare plain-spoken comparison of commercial geometry kernels and their limitations.

AI-generated summary and labels from the source dataset; verify important details against the video. Source & credits.

From the Hacker News discussion

s1mon · 2023-02 · rec

Nick Kallen has been working on an BREP based CAD tool with the sort of ease of modeling that things like Blender has. Originally it was based on C3D, but he switched halfway through to Parasolid.[0] It’s amazing the amount of features he has built considering it’s a one person project. It’s worth going through his progress report videos.[1] [0] [VIDEO] [1] [LINK]

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virtualritz · 2023-02 · rec

See also this thread[1] from yesterday which has some interesting comments on the limitations projects based on the OpenCascade kernel face. Mentions an interesting video[2] going through the commercial geometry kernel options and their resp. limitations from the author of [3]. [1] [LINK] [2] [VIDEO] [3] [LINK]

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awhitty · 2024-03 · rec

The creator of this app, Nick Kallen, has a nice YouTube channel where he talks about some of the behind-the-scenes work on the project. I think his video comparing geometry kernels [0] was posted to HN a while back, but it's worth a watch if you're curious! [0]: [VIDEO]

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ruevs · 2025-06 · reference

The other "decent" commercial one that can be licensed is C3D (ASCON/АСКОН uses a CAD kernel based on it in КОМПАС 3D) but it is Russian and thus currently "behind sanctions". Here is a bit on it from the author of Plasticity: [VIDEO] it initially was based on C3D.

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