Gable CAD

Gable CAD, or Gable 4D Series, was a British architectural computer-aided design package initially developed in the early 1980s.

Gable CAD

Developer(s)	Sheffield University Gable CAD Systems
Initial release	1985
Platform	UNIX
Type	computer-aided design
License	commercial software

History

Gable CAD was developed at the University of Sheffield in the mid-1980s^[1] under the leadership of Professor Bryan Lawson.^[2] It was spun out into Gable CAD Systems Limited (incorporated in 1984)^[3] and retained links with the university until its demise in 1996 when a court order was made for compulsory winding up.^[4]

An early building information modeling application, Gable CAD was an advanced 2D and 3D design package with different modules, and was operated via a Windows-style interface and mouse running on UNIX. It was possible to create detailed 3D models and then generate 2D drawings or rendered visualisations from the data.^[5]

The assets of the company were acquired by Auxer in 1997 and aimed to complete the conversion of Gable CAD to Windows NT^[6] but this does not appear to have ever been released.