When I was starting out creating 3d models in university I was amazed by the possibilities of CAD. After the first time getting in contact to it, I knew that this is the path I want to pursue. Even after I came home from university, I would sit at my desk and create 3d cad models of things that I thought were interesting. Some weeks after my first contact with CAD Software I learned about technical drawings and their importance in manufacturing. Some time after that I learned about other tasks that would be performed in CAD on a part, like simulating stresses in the part material and I thought to myself: Do I have to go through all of these steps for every part?
Weeks and even months passed, but this question somehow stuck in my head. How could I accelerate the process of creating different cad models with all the features that are needed for manufacturing. One day I stumbled upon a video on youtube showing someone change the cad model controlled by a single spreadsheet. I knew spreadsheets very well at that point, because i was using them for all kinds of projects to calculate stuff. This was one of those moments it just klicked in my head. I realized how much potential using spreadsheets to control my cad models can have. And thanks to the power of cad software all the geometry dependent tasks would automatically be updated. This also allowed me to create a set of public parameters in the spreadsheet that another user could easily change around without going into the model geometry manually.
From that day on I use spreadsheet in most of my cad models. It makes them very flexible and fast to make changes.
When I started using FreeCAD, 5 years after coming into contact with cad software, I knew that I needed to test out the freecad internal spreadsheets first. This was a very important component of my creation process and it worked flawlessly. I did not expect it to work right away. This now also meant that sharing parameteric cad models was very easy. My plan was settled. I was going to create all my cad models in freecad from now on. Soon I would adapt a specific formatting of my spreadsheets in freecad, utilizing cell aliases to quickly reference values in the spreadsheet from the model geometry.
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