Set up by hand

If the installer didn’t connect your app, or you’d rather do it yourself, each app below has a page with the exact steps. Every one of them starts the same CADshift program on your PC.

App	Page
Claude Desktop	Claude Desktop
LM Studio	LM Studio
AnythingLLM Desktop	AnythingLLM
Jan	Jan

Using Claude Code, Cursor, VS Code or Devin Desktop (Windsurf)? They are in Developer tools.

Find the path to the CADshift program

Every app needs the full path to one file: the CADshift MCP server, cadshift-mcp-autocad.exe. The installer puts it here:

%LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\CADshift\AutoCAD MCP\server\cadshift-mcp-autocad.exe

Most apps don’t understand %LOCALAPPDATA%, so you need the full path with your Windows user name in it:

Press Windows + R, paste %LOCALAPPDATA%\Programs\CADshift\AutoCAD MCP\server and press Enter. File Explorer opens the folder, with cadshift-mcp-autocad.exe in it.
Click the address bar at the top. It now shows the full path, for example C:\Users\jsmith\AppData\Local\Programs\CADshift\AutoCAD MCP\server.
Add \cadshift-mcp-autocad.exe to the end. That’s your path:

C:\Users\jsmith\AppData\Local\Programs\CADshift\AutoCAD MCP\server\cadshift-mcp-autocad.exe

In a JSON file, double every backslash

Settings files (.json) treat a single \ as a special character. When you paste the path into one, write every \ twice:

C:\\Users\\jsmith\\AppData\\Local\\Programs\\CADshift\\AutoCAD MCP\\server\\cadshift-mcp-autocad.exe

In an app’s own form (a box labelled Command), paste the path as it is, with single backslashes.

The app pages below use YOUR-NAME where your Windows user name goes.

What to expect from local models

LM Studio, AnythingLLM and Jan can run a model on your own PC. That keeps everything offline, but be realistic about the results:

Small models handle tools poorly. CADshift offers over a hundred tools. Models that fit on an ordinary PC (7 to 14 billion parameters) often pick the wrong tool, skip one, or stop half way. Larger models with good tool support do much better, and cloud models such as Claude do best.
Choose a model that supports tool use. Each app marks these. Without it, the model can’t call CADshift at all.
Give it room. The list of CADshift tools takes up a lot of the model’s context. Set the context length as high as your PC allows.
Start with simple requests, such as “List the layers in the open drawing”, before asking for drafting work.

Ollama

Ollama runs models but has no place to add tools such as CADshift. Put an app in front of it: AnythingLLM and Jan can both use a model served by Ollama, and they then call CADshift for it. (LM Studio runs its own models instead.)

ChatGPT

The ChatGPT desktop app can’t run tools on your PC. It connects to tools only over the internet. A ChatGPT connection through the CADshift relay is planned, but not available yet.