Plinth

Appearance

Getting started ​

Plinth is a desktop catalog for disk-scale 3D-print libraries: point it at the folders where your models already live and it gives you search, designer/release browsing, rendered previews, duplicate merging, space-saving packing, and a way to distribute releases and migrate your collection without losing curation. Your files stay where they are — Plinth indexes them, it doesn't move them (unless you ask it to).

1. Install ​

Grab the build for your OS from the releases page — see the installation guide for the unsigned-app warnings you'll click through on first run.

2. First launch: the render engine ​

Plinth renders model previews with Blender. On first launch it looks for an existing installation and offers to download its own private copy (~350 MB) if none is found or yours is older than the look is tuned for. You can skip this — everything except preview rendering works without Blender, and you can set it up later in Settings.

3. Point Plinth at your library ​

In Settings, add your library folder(s) as catalog folders. Multiple folders are supported, including network storage (NAS/SMB shares) — each folder is scanned and indexed separately.

Then run a scan. Plinth walks the folder, indexes every model file (STL/OBJ/3MF and slicer scenes), and derives designers, releases, groups, and poses from the folder structure and any metadata sidecars it finds. Rescanning is safe at any time: your edits (names, tags, pose assignments) are stored so they survive every rescan.

4. Browse and curate ​

The Catalog tab is home:

The Plinth catalog: preview cards grouped by designer and release, with search facets

  • Search and facets — filter by designer, search by name or tag.
  • Groups and poses — variants of one model appear as one card with its members; open the drawer for files, metadata, tags, and a 3D preview.
  • Print — the PRINT button opens a file picker (pre-sliced scenes pre-checked over raw geometry) and hands the ticked files to your slicer.
  • Render previews — render one model from the drawer or batch-render everything that's missing a preview from the toolbar. Chosen orientations are remembered per model.
  • Clean up — the catalog cleaner can restructure a messy folder tree into Plinth's canonical layout; every move is shown for review before anything is touched.

5. Reclaim disk space ​

Two independent tools, both safe by construction:

  • Merge duplicates — a duplicate scan finds byte-identical files (one base repeated across five weapon variants…) and merges them with hardlinks where the volume supports it: stored once, still present in every variant, printing and browsing keep working.
  • Pack models — models you rarely touch can be packed into a compressed archive in place ("📦 packed"). The catalog stays complete — packed models are still searchable, previewable, and printable (files are extracted just-in-time) — and unpacking restores the loose files exactly. Packed models can't be normalized, moved, or staged into a release until unpacked; the UI tells you when that's the reason something is disabled.

6. Import a release ​

Drag a release.3pk (with its sibling component archives next to it) onto the Plinth window, or double-click the file. You'll get an import dialog showing every component with its size — checksum-verified extraction, then the release appears in your catalog with all the creator's curation. Opening a newer version of a release you already imported offers only what changed. Details in Distributing & moving your library.