Status: RULINGS RECORDED. Aristide's answers to the [design agenda](../agenda/), given 2026-08-19. Items 0 (the A/B/C pick), 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 remain open, plus the MSO7 0.125" part-tab width. Item 3 (panel inventory) is answered by process: the partners will document what MetaCam has in a separate document and upload it — inventory work waits for that file.
Own shop: laser operators come back and ask for changes. Those changes are made on the fly by the CAD Master operator: *"We need to be able to pull the job in, open it up, make changes, repost it, and then continue on with the work that we were already doing without interruption."* The laser operator would typically never be the main CAD Master operator.
Other shops: *"Our software needs to wrap itself around their workflow instead of them being forced to wrap themselves into our workflow"* — versatility is the requirement (the same principle as Jordan's story 1, now ruled for shop workflows, not just file edits). Who sits in front of it: one or several operators depending on shop size, most with a CAD background. The interface with all the options is one station: *"Who else needs access to that if it does its job correctly?"*
Floor operators in cadmaster: generally NO. The floor works from a paper or PDF copy of the program — preview, material, program number, maybe time estimates: *"What does it look like? How much material am I using?"* At the machine the laser operator has the machine's own control interface for the G-code we supply, and makes machine-side modifications there (e.g. an unplanned rerun on yesterday's material — done at the laser, not in cadmaster). Layout and cut order are decided in cadmaster; machine-side execution details belong to the machine.
Design consequences recorded:
Sales gets a stripped-down version: upload files, assign material types, get auto-generated nests → material-use estimates and time estimates → pricing. Sales views the main tool only partially; good auto-nest makes their quotes better.
Pricing carries a shop fee: *"We will have a shop fee for a minimal startup... in a table, and each shop can then decide what their minimum startup is"* — even the smallest job carries the shop's minimum charge. A per-shop pricing/minimum-fee table joins the table family (same discipline as materials/machine: a row someone types, never a literal in code).
The sales-originated job flow: job comes in → salesman uploads → auto-nest + tables give an accurate layout → saved as a starting point → the CAD Master operator generates the program from it → automation produces a customer approval file → once approved: final nest, heal check, review, cut plan, G-code. Aristide's scope note, verbatim: *"the programs could almost originate from the sales team at that point... It probably just moves the start. It doesn't move the program."*
Design consequences recorded:
The partners will document MetaCam's panels/options in a separate document and upload it. The inventory discussion resumes when that file arrives.
Both light and dark, one-click switchable. (Agenda item 4's other halves — hardware, gloves, color-blind-safe status marks — not yet answered; still open.)
Yes: shortcuts on favorites, configurable on certain ones. The standard copy/paste/cut set is fixed and not editable. Per-user, riding the same workspace/preset machinery as layouts.
Item 0 (the A/B/C pick — the new station profile bears on it), item 4's hardware + color-blind halves, item 6 (how a gate says no), item 7 (editing mechanics), item 8 (draw-from-scratch scope), item 9 (first hour), item 10 (brand identity + who holds the pen), the MetaCam panel document (upload pending), and Jordan's part-tab width for MSO7 0.125" — still the number blocking the four posts.
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*"Just like in Adobe: once the program is activated, I can select my tools by just clicking one letter on the keyboard."* Every tool gets a one-letter key (Illustrator's V/P/T pattern); this rides with the configurable-favorites ruling, copy/paste/cut still fixed.
*"This is where we take some ownership and say: this is the one thing they will have to learn from us — we cannot communicate clearly to them anything unless they are willing to learn what our colors and circles etc. mean. It doesn't mean we have to make it complicated... any visual learner will pick it up within minutes. It's not hard for me to figure out how my iPhone works even if it's a brand new application. Intuitiveness is a must."*
Recorded as: cadmaster's status/gate language (the colors, dots, glows, flags) is a designed vocabulary we own and teach once — in the first-run tour (item 9) — not something diluted to resemble every other tool. The bar: a visual learner reads it in minutes; iPhone-grade intuitiveness. This slots above the still-open mechanical question of blocking presentation (modal vs flag), which follows the vocabulary.
"Yes to all" — node-level editing of healed geometry, typed values, gates re-running behind every edit (the editable-everything principle's mechanics).
Preferences, Adobe-style: configurable nudge notches for keyboard cursor steps, and per-user working units. *"I foresee our software being used in Canada, where they want metric, and in the US, where they don't... Either way, whatever units they are using, inputs should be interchangeable. If I think in inches but my colleague thinks in millimeters, they should be able to type in 3 mm and the software understands. Same as Illustrator: 3 pt or 3 mm."*
Recorded as a standing convention: every numeric input field accepts a unit suffix and converts (3mm, 0.125in, later 3pt where sensible), regardless of the session's display units; display units are a per-user preference switchable per Adobe's model. Internal math stays inches (the pipeline's native unit; the 4-decimal emit rule is unchanged) — units are an INPUT/DISPLAY skin, never a second source of truth.
*"A real sketcher, with one caveat"* (transcribed "one cafe" — read as caveat): all the primitives — lines, arcs, circles — available and assignable numerical values; an operator who knows the software can literally describe a line and bring it into a circle. Scope for v1: the dimensioned-primitive sketcher, not a constraint-solver CAD. Born-clean geometry rides the normal pipeline from QC on.
Jordan gives Aristide full control of the visual identity; Jordan reviews the result first. Aristide will purchase the domain, point it at the server (transcription garbled: "do the MLB to the surfer" — read as DNS to the server), and hand over control so cadmaster can run its own subdomains. Details arrive with the domain.
Item 0 — the A/B/C pick — is now the ONLY unanswered design question, plus: item 4's hardware + color-blind halves, the MetaCam panel document (upload pending), bug-server + auto-capture details, the domain handoff — and Jordan's part-tab width for MSO7 0.125".
RULED, "what we do want for sure": the canvas always tells you how far you are zoomed, two ways at once —
Both live on the canvas on every tab. Note for execution: a percentage is only meaningful against a calibrated monitor (Adobe's 100% is screen-DPI-relative); the scale bar is self-proving at any DPI, which is why we carry both — the number for muscle memory, the bar for truth. Fit On Screen joins the preset list; a Fit Sheet / Fit Part pair belongs there too for our canvas.
Aristide, 2026-08-19: "A+C." The Combo as drawn: the docked Workbench is the ground state on every workstation; C's machinery underneath — tear-off panels, second-monitor placement, named per-user Adobe-style workspaces, one-letter tool keys — with snap-back always one click. Build order per the cases brief: the dock ships first, looking designed; the graft follows fast on an architecture that plans for it from day one. This closes the panel-layout question from /design/look/. The look-and-feel design now proceeds on A+C; Aristide holds the visual-identity pen (item 10), Jordan reviews.