EZCUT

A CNC cut-line and drill-point layout editor for PCBs and panel work — Python / Tkinter, single file, runs anywhere.

Overview

EZCUT lets you draw cut lines and drill points on a snap grid, then export two G-code files — one for the spindle cutting pass and one for the drill pass. You load and save layouts as plain-text .wrk files.

The window has three areas: the canvas (the drawing area), the status bar at the bottom (shows file, object counts, grid size, and current mode), and the menu bar at the top (File, Grid, Gcodes).

All interaction is mouse-driven. Left-click places or selects. Right-click opens the radial mode menu. ESC cancels whatever is in progress.

Download & Requirements

⇩ Download EZCUT0_8_36.py

EZCUT is free software. It runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux — anywhere Python is available. It requires Python 3.9 or later and uses only the standard library (no extra packages to install). Tkinter is included with most Python distributions.

If Python is not already on your machine, download it from python.org. On the download page, choose the installer for your operating system and follow the instructions. On Windows, tick "Add Python to PATH" during installation.

Once Python is installed, open a terminal (Command Prompt / PowerShell on Windows, Terminal on macOS/Linux) and run:

python EZCUT0_8_36.py

On some systems the command may be python3 instead of python.

The Grid

EZCUT displays two overlapping snap grids:

Default board size is 7 × 4 inches. The origin (0, 0) is at the bottom-left. Coordinates increase right (+X) and up (+Y), matching standard CNC convention.

Resize the board with the Shift / Ctrl + arrow keys (see Grid Settings).

Colour Key

Right-Click Menu

Right-clicking anywhere on the canvas opens a 3-column radial popup centred on the mouse. The mouse lands on the Return cell so you can close the menu with a single right-click if you change your mind.

Moving the mouse outside the popup dismisses it without any change. Clicking a cell picks that action.

Row 4 (Move / Stretch / Copy) only appears when items are selected. Paste only appears when the copy buffer is non-empty. The transform cells (Rot CCW, Rot CW, H Flip, V Flip) only appear when items are selected or a move/paste ghost is live.

Add Mode

In Add mode every left-click either extends a cut line or places a drill point. The grid snap determines which:

Finishing a cut line

A cut segment ends when you:

• Double-click the last point
• Click the same point twice
• Press ESC

Press Backspace to remove the last placed point and step back one vertex.

Select Mode

Point click: click on or near a cut segment or drill point to select it (it turns white). Click in empty space to deselect all.

Rubber-band: left-drag to draw a selection rectangle. Everything fully inside the rectangle is added to the selection.

Delete Mode

Click anywhere on a cut segment or on a drill point to delete that single item. The click finds the nearest object — you do not need to click exactly on the line.

If items are already selected when you pick Delete from the menu, they are deleted immediately without a further click.

Auto Mode

Auto is a toggle on the Add mode. When active, the status bar shows Add+Select. Toggling it off shows Add.

The practical effect: you can draw new lines and select/rubber-band existing ones without switching modes. A click near a grid point draws; a click away from the grid selects.

Move

1. Select one or more items.
2. Right-click → Move.
3. A white ghost of the selection appears immediately, anchored at the lowest-left point of the selection.
4. Move the mouse to the destination — the ghost follows, snapping to the cut grid.
5. Left-click to place. The originals are removed and the items land at the new position.

Press ESC or right-click to cancel Move without committing.

Copy & Paste

Copy

1. Select items.
2. Right-click → Copy.
3. Left-click once to set the anchor point. The items are saved to the copy buffer and the selection clears. Nothing moves.

Paste

1. Right-click → Paste (only visible when the buffer is non-empty).
2. The ghost follows the mouse with the copy anchor under the cursor.
3. Left-click to place a copy. The mode stays active — click again to place another copy.
4. Press ESC or right-click to exit Paste mode.

Stretch

Stretch is like Move, but cut segments that connect selected items to non-selected items are stretched rather than translated whole. This lets you widen a section of your layout without breaking connectivity.

1. Select the items you want to move (the "pulled" region).
2. Right-click → Stretch.
3. The selected items ghost in white; connecting segments ghost in grey dashes to show how they will stretch.
4. Left-click the destination to commit. All selected items translate by the same delta; connecting Segs have their shared endpoint pulled along.

Press ESC or right-click to cancel Stretch.

Rotate & Flip

These appear in the top row of the right-click menu when a selection or live ghost exists.

After picking a transform, the status bar shows "click pivot point". Click any cut-grid point to apply. When used on a live Move/Paste ghost the transform applies to the ghost without committing it.

Undo / Redo

The undo stack stores the full state of objs[] before each mutating action. It is cleared whenever a new action is committed after an undo.

Grid Settings

Open via Grid → Grid Settings… or Ctrl+G.

Resizing edges with the keyboard

The data origin (0, 0) stays fixed on screen as edges move.

Zoom & Pan

Zoom-in limit: at least one major square must remain visible on each axis. Zoom-out limit: the baseline scale where the full grid fits the window.

File I/O (.wrk)

The .wrk file is plain text. Lines starting with ; are comments and are preserved on save. Lines starting with # or unparseable lines trigger a "Removing strange lines" warning on load.

G-code Export

Select File → Save .gcode. EZCUT generates two separate files:

After generating the G-code, EZCUT briefly draws the tool path on the canvas:

• ► Solid yellow arrows — the spindle is cutting along this segment
• - - → Dashed yellow arrows — the spindle is moving (not cutting) to the next start point

The overlay disappears automatically when you close the save dialog. Take a screenshot first if you want to keep the view.

The save dialog lets you choose Save or Skip for each file independently, then Close.

Routing algorithm

Both the cuts pass and the drill pass use a greedy nearest-neighbour route starting from the point closest to the machine origin (0, 0). For cut segments the algorithm picks the unvisited segment whose nearest endpoint is closest to the current spindle tip, then enters that endpoint and cuts to the other end. This produces a practical, low-travel-distance path without the overhead of a full TSP solver.

G-code Templates

Open via Gcodes → G-code Templates… or Ctrl+K. Four template strings control the output:

CutLine template syntax

The CutLine template uses parentheses to split the output into three parts:

prefix (per_point) suffix

• prefix — emitted once when a new chain starts (e.g. G1 Z-0.012 F3 to plunge)
• per_point — emitted for every point in the chain with lowercase x and y replaced by the actual coordinates
• suffix — emitted once at the end of each chain (e.g. G1 Z0.05 F30 to retract)

Clicking Apply & Save G-code saves the templates and immediately launches the G-code export flow.

Keyboard Reference

.wrk File Format

Plain text, one record per line:

; comment line (preserved on save)
<row>  <mode>  <x_in>  <y_in>

Mode codes:

Blank lines are silently skipped. Non-matching content triggers the "Removing strange lines" dialog on load.

Example:

; Hall Effect Sensor board
1  2  0.100  0.100
2  3  0.500  0.100
3  4  0.500  0.500
4  5  0.300  0.300

Tips & Tricks