Project overview
Purpose
IFC Core provides a local Open → Inspect → Edit → Save pipeline for IFC4. It
does not require a server and does not build a complete object tree during
open. Source bytes stay immutable; edits are collected in a Patch Overlay and
materialized only when a new file is written.
Audience
- Rust BIM application developers;
- browser and Node.js teams that need a local WASM API;
- R&D and QA teams using the Reference Viewer;
- integrators using deterministic DTOs and read-only MCP tools.
Current product
- The
ifccoreRust facade. - Browser ESM and Node.js CommonJS WASM packages.
- A WebGL2/Three.js Browser Reference Viewer.
- Examples, diagnostics, SBOM/checksums, and release artifacts.
The release SLA is limited to IFC4 ADD2 TC1 / IFC-SPF. IFC2X3 and IFC4X3 metadata are compatibility previews. One WASM input session is limited to 128 MiB; the alpha target profile is up to 100 MB.
Out of scope today
Full BIM authoring, collaboration, BCF, clash detection, a cloud service, universal exact BRep, a desktop package, and a stable MCP API.
Design principles
Local processing, explicit lifecycle, byte-oriented lazy decoding, official buildingSMART EXPRESS schemas, deterministic output, versioned DTOs, and no LLM or network client in the base core.