Technical Support

Please submit any questions via email to garth@jacqcad.com

Technical Manual
opt-Click here to download the JacqCAD Technical Manual.
2007 edition, 204 pages, PDF format, 8 MB

Handouts
Mini-tutorials on how to use various tools and processes in JacqCAD.

Help pages
JacqCAD's built-in help pages

Miscellaneous Articles
Fredy Casilla's video about JacqCAD A 15 minute video by independent designer Fredy Casilla of Lima, Peru, in which he explores JacqCAD's many menu options.
Yarn_Measures_Diameters_Sett.pdf (552 KB)   A discussion of the various Yarn Measures and how they relate to yarn diameter, sett, cover, shrinkage and fabric weight. Published in May 2011 Complex Weavers Jacquard Study Group newsletter.
Measuring_Yarns.pdf (132 KB)   A description of an inexpensive ($20) and accurate way to determine the "yarn measure" of unknown yarns.
Multi_Layer_Wves.pdf (344 KB)   A description of how to use JacqCAD's ML Weaves Template to help draft mutli-layer weaves which use independent warps and wefts.
CW_Sep04_Jacquard_Intro.pdf (712 KB)   An introduction to Jacquard technology, reprint from Sep 2004 Complex Weavers Journal.
Schira2001.pdf (7.5 MB)   A conversation with Cynthia Schira about the role of JacqCAD in handweaving, published in the American Craft Council's August/September 2001 issue of American Craft.

Other sources of Jacquard weaving information
Links to Jacquard information

Latest JacqCAD ShareWare release
opt-Click here to download the latest version of JacqCAD release 4.34b6, 13 August 2015. Added: Punch As... Dornier Dobby .DES file; fixed startup exit when Color Picker extension was missing... Requires Stuffit Expander and password to decompress.

opt-Click here to download only the latest 4.34b6 release notes (which are included in the above). No password needed.

JacqCAD requires a PowerPC-based Mac computer (G3, G4 or G5) running Mac OS X 10.4 or earlier with Classic installed, or OS 9.
It can also run using the freeware SheepShaver OS 9 Emulator on Intel-based Macs running OS X 10.5 (Leopard) through 10.15 (Catalina), on MacOS 11 (Big Sur) through MacOX 12 (Monterey), on Windows XP, 7 or 10 (tested by users), and possibly under Linux (not yet tested). Please see my notes about using SheepShaver and the limitations thereof.

The above compressed archive requires a password to open. Please fill in this form.  I will reply with the necessary password. After spending 20 years developing the software I am curious about how many people are finding it to be of interest and whether it would be useful to continue work on it...

You will need the FREE Stuffit Expander utility in order to expand the .sitx compressed file (because of the passwording). Stuffit Expander can be downloaded at no cost from Smith Micro . It is a wonderful utility which expands a very wide variety of Macintosh, Windows and Unix compressed formats - a "must have" for any Mac user!

The full version of Stuffit, which does cost a small amount, allows you to create compressed archives; I find it very useful, but you do not need it to access JacqCAD.

When downloading in Safari you may get an error message if you have the "[x] Open "safe" files after downloading" checked in    Safari > Preferences > General. That tells Safari to "open" any file it downloads, which in the case of a compressed file means it will try to expand it - at which point it runs into the passwording and reports an error... Similarly, if you simply double-click on the .sitx file, Mac OS X may again call on its Archive Utility to expand the file and it will again report an error due to the password. To avoid this issue, simply drag and drop the .sitx file onto Stuffit Expander and it will handle it correctly.

Another issue, now solved, is that Safari under Mac OS X 10.4 (but not 10.3 or 10.5 or 10.6) would append ".txt" to the downloaded file - so it would now appears as JacqCAD_4.30b7_14apr10.sitx.txt. You would have to remove the ".txt" before you could feed the archive to Stuffit Expander.
This has now been fixed at the website server end and should no longer occur.

We have just discovered (June 5, 2010) that Stuffit Expander 8.0.2 (which is the latest version recomended for OS X 10.2.x) does not handle passworded .SITx archives - instead it immediately reports "error 17507" without ever giving the user a chance to enter the password.
Solutions: use an older version of Stuffit (7 is OK); or update to OS X 10.3 or 10.4 (10.2 and earlier are less stable, 10.3 and 10.4 seem rock-solid) so you can use a later Stuffit; or contact us directly and ask us to send you an unpassworded version by direct email.

Miscellaneous related files and utilities:

  Downloadable utility programs to convert weaves between other Jacquard CAD systems.

   "JacqCAD MASTER Palettes" folder. This folder should be placed in the folder alongside your working copy of JacqCAD MASTER. The palettes in this folder are appended to JacqCAD's  Options >> Change Palette... menu. They include standard palettes used in EAT, Grosse and Weavette CAD systems as well as a set of palettes (SS...) which provide useful starting points for customized user palettes. If you wish to add your own custom palettes use File >> Save As... >> Palette, store the palette file in this folder and restart JacqCAD.

NO WARRANTY

BECAUSE JACQCAD MASTER IS LICENSED FREE OF CHARGE, THERE IS NO WARRANTY FOR THE PROGRAM, TO THE EXTENT PERMITTED BY APPLICABLE LAW. THE PROGRAM IS PROVIDED "AS IS" WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EITHER EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. THE ENTIRE RISK AS TO THE QUALITY AND PERFORMANCE OF THE PROGRAM IS WITH YOU. SHOULD THE PROGRAM PROVE DEFECTIVE, YOU ASSUME THE COST OF ALL NECESSARY SERVICING, REPAIR OR CORRECTION.

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