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Connect an AI assistant

FundaCAD has a built-in server that lets an AI assistant build and check parts with the same engine as the app. It works with any assistant that supports MCP.

  1. Open Edit, Preferences (Ctrl+,) and choose AI assistants.
  2. Under How to connect it, pick your assistant in Assistant.
  3. Press Copy. The text has your real path filled in.
  4. Use the text in your assistant:
    1. Claude Code: run the claude mcp add command in a terminal, then start a new session.
    2. Claude Desktop: add the block to claude_desktop_config.json through Settings, Developer, Edit Config, then restart it.
    3. Another MCP host: start the program with --mcp, or give it the same block Claude Desktop takes.

Where it may open and save files

The assistant can open, import, save and export files in any of your folders. It never reads or writes:

  1. in hidden folders, whose names start with a dot, such as .ssh
  2. directly in your home folder
  3. at the root of a drive

To keep it to some folders only, add --allow-path and a folder after --mcp in the copied text, once per folder. For example --mcp --allow-path D:/parts.

It then works only in those folders, the folder of your open document and the app's own folders. When it is refused a file, it says why and which folder would let it through.

Long replies on big models

A reply that lists every body, face or clash of a big model would fill the assistant's memory with rows that say the same thing. So once a model has more than 10 bodies:

  1. a reply starts with a summary, the counts and totals
  2. bodies alike in all but their names fold into one row
  3. it shows 30 rows

A pattern of 3,000 pins reads as one row:

body1 "Pin": 2.0 x 2.0 x 2.0 mm, vol 8 mm3, 6 faces, 12 triangles (and 2999 more alike: body4..body3002, named "Pin 2".."Pin 3000")

Nothing is out of reach. The last line of a shortened reply says how to ask for the rest, and the assistant asks only for what it needs:

  1. offset pages on to the next rows, and limit 0 shows every row.
  2. body or bodies narrows the reply to the parts it names.
  3. detail and selectors on inspect add the faces and edges, 5 bodies a page once there are more than 10.
  4. outline on section adds the loop points.
  5. A clash check that steps a parameter (sweep) gives each step with more than 10 clashing pairs as their total and the 10 largest.
  6. full gives the whole reply, one row per body, pair or file.

You do not set any of this yourself, the assistant reads the summary and asks for the details.