BIM Beaver

IFC, short for Industry Foundation Classes, is a data model used to describe architectural and construction industry-related data. It’s a format primarily used by the so-called Building Information Modeling (or BIM) programs. One of the main advantages of this format is the fact that it incorporates the model of a building or facility with all the included spatial elements, materials, and shapes.

The IFC file format is used for interoperability purposes between the industry’s BIM and CAD program such as Revit, AutoCAD, Tekla BIMsight, and ArchiCAD, Adobe Acrobat Pro extended, and others. These types of apps are usually very bulky and cost a lot of money, hence, which might make them quite inappropriate for a user who just wants to view IFC files. This is where BIM Beaver comes into play.

BIM Beaver is a lightweight, and snappy IFC file reader which allows users to explore and view IFC 3D models and all their associated properties and building elements. Before anything else, it’s important to note that the software supports two IFC formats, namely 2x3 and 4.

Users are also provided with the option of enabling or disabling all building elements, as well as with the possibility of exporting the projects at hand to STL and OBJ formats.

Subsequent to a typical installation procedure, users are greeted by the app’s non-impressive and simplistic GUI. There are two main (tab) sections, namely Home and Option. From the first one, users can open IFC files and change aspects related to the display settings such as the perspective, the number of displayed cells, and so forth. The second tab allows users to access the Help and Options section.

Another two important GUI elements are the Project View and the Property View panels which are located on the right side of the GUI (by default). However, these two elements can be locked into place on either part of the viewer’s window.

BIM Beaver is an efficient CAD-viewer that allows users to effortlessly preview IFC files and analyze all their relevant aspects and elements.