The solidly command

Solidly ships a standalone solidly executable that does two things: it opens a model in the application, and it renders images using the same renderer the application uses.

Installing

Solidly installs the command for you. The setup that runs the first time Solidly opens includes a step named Use Solidly from the command line, with a switch named Install the solidly command. The same installation is available afterwards in Settings ▸ Advanced ▸ Command Line Tool, where the row shows the status of /usr/local/bin/solidly and offers Install while the command is not installed.

Installing creates a symbolic link at /usr/local/bin/solidly that points to the executable inside the application bundle, Solidly.app/Contents/Helpers/solidly. macOS asks for an administrator password when that folder is not writable, which is normally the case on a Mac with Apple silicon. Because /usr/local/bin is already on the default PATH, the command works in every shell without any change to a shell startup file.

Solidly does not remove the link. To remove the command, delete the link from a shell:

sudo rm /usr/local/bin/solidly

The link can also be created by hand, which has the same effect as Install:

sudo ln -sf "/Applications/Solidly.app/Contents/Helpers/solidly" /usr/local/bin/solidly

The command must stay a link rather than a copy, because it locates the renderer's resources through the application bundle it belongs to.

Shape

solidly <model>
solidly render <file-or-folder> [options]

render can also be written as -r, -render, or --render.

A bare model path opens that file in Solidly, exactly as opening it from the Finder would. Opening requires a single supported model file. A folder is refused, with a message suggesting -r to render it instead.

Help and version

solidly --help
solidly render --help
solidly --version

solidly --help, or solidly with no arguments, prints a short usage summary. solidly render --help prints the full option list, and solidly help render, solidly -r -h, and solidly -render -help do the same. The usage summary and the version are printed even while Solidly is locked on the Mac. The full option list, like every other command, requires Solidly to be unlocked.

What it accepts

solidly render accepts any of the following as <file-or-folder>:

• a single .gltf, .glb, .fbx, .obj, .stl, .ply, .usd, .usda, .usdc, .usdz, .step, .stp, .iges, .igs, or .3mf file
• a folder containing a model and its sibling files
• a folder containing many models
• a folder of subfolders containing models

Folder scanning follows the same rules as the application, described in Opening files and folders.

Rendering

solidly render ~/Models --output ~/Renders --preset front --resolution 3840x2160

Every render setting is an ordinary command line option, so a complete invocation can be kept in a shell script. solidly render is the full option reference.

The renderer enforces the same import memory limit the application does. A file large enough that it could not fit within the limit is refused before it loads, reported as a failure, and the run continues with the next model. A model that exceeds the limit while it is loading stops the whole run, because the tool loads models in its own process. The tool then writes the reason to standard error and exits with status 78, and any images already written remain in the output folder.

Trial and purchase

The command line tool works while Solidly is unlocked on the Mac, during the free trial or after Solidly has been bought. It does not connect to app.solidly.dev itself. It reads the confirmation that the Solidly application records each time it checks the account, so the application must have been opened and signed in on the same Mac. See Free trial and purchase.

solidly, solidly --help, and solidly --version always run. Every other command checks first, and when Solidly is locked it writes the reason to standard error and exits with a failure status without opening or rendering anything.

A script that runs the tool unattended should check its exit status, because a locked Mac produces no output files.