BamDude Bridge v0.2.0

BamDude Bridge learns its second job: printing labels on a printer plugged into this computer.

Label printing

BamDude draws a spool label and puts it in a queue; this app comes and takes it. Nothing connects to your desktop, so it works on a laptop, behind NAT, or through a firewall that would never allow the reverse.

Turn the role on under Label printer, pick the serial port, and the machine appears in BamDude under Settings → Filament → Marking — listed, but switched off. It stays that way until somebody enables it there: signing in proves the app is yours, not that this particular printer should be given your labels. The id you match it by is shown in the app, with a copy button.

Currently the Niimbot B1 over USB. The app names the model it finds and says plainly when it meets one it cannot drive yet.

⚠️ Close the NIIMBOT desktop app first — it holds the serial port exclusively, and nothing else can open it while it is running.

Updates

The app now updates itself. It looks shortly after starting and every few hours after that, shows what changed, and installs on a button.

Both builds are covered, and they work differently on purpose. The installer build runs the new installer with a progress bar and comes back. The portable build replaces its own executable in place and restarts — it never turns itself into an installed copy, and it refuses rather than half-applying if the folder it sits in is not writable.

⚠️ This part only helps from here on. Version 0.1.0 has no updater, so if that is what you are running, this one has to be downloaded by hand. Everything after it updates itself.

Smaller things

• The tray icon is legible now. It was the app icon — a plate with the mark taking 41% of its width — which beside other tray icons read as a small badge rather than a peer.
• The window remembers the size you left it at. It no longer offers a maximise button, which a settings window has no use for; resizing still works.
• Updates has its own tab instead of sitting under whichever one you happened to be on.

BamDude Bridge v0.1.0

First stable release. Windows only — the BambuStudio integration it exists for was never implemented for macOS.

What it does

Registers itself as the receiver for BambuStudio's Send to Bambu Farm Manager Client, and puts the sliced plate straight into your BamDude library. The server side needed no new code: it is the library upload endpoint that was already there.

Downloads

• …-setup.exe — installer. Start Menu entry, uninstaller, and it fetches the WebView2 runtime if the machine lacks it.
• …-portable.zip — unpack and run. Does everything the installed build does, because registration is a button in the app rather than installer work.

The unversioned copies of each are stable links for pointing at from elsewhere.

First run

1. Server address and an API key. The key needs the library-manage scope, and nothing else.
2. Test connection — it checks the address, the key, and whether that key may actually add files to your library, so a green answer means the first plate will land.
3. Register Bridge as the receiver — one administrator prompt, for the single registry key BambuStudio looks for. Autostart and notification identity come with it.
4. Restart BambuStudio. It reads that key only at startup, so the menu entry will not appear in an already-open slicer.

⚠️ Do not run it as administrator

BambuStudio runs with normal rights, and Windows will not let it hand a file to an elevated app. Every send from the slicer would then quietly do nothing — no error, no log, no file. Bridge warns you in red if it finds itself elevated.

Registering does not need you to elevate the app: it raises a separate short-lived process for the one key that requires it.

Worth knowing

• Unsigned. SmartScreen warns on first run: More info → Run anyway.
• Closing the window hides it. The app lives in the tray; Quit there is the only real exit. Staying resident lets a plate reach the running instance instead of paying a cold start each time.
• A success is a notification, not a window. The slicer is in front of you; only a failure takes the screen. The tray tooltip carries the last outcome either way, and everything is written to %LOCALAPPDATA%\top.bamdude.bridge\logs\.
• If you move a portable copy, press Register again. Registration stores the path of the executable that performed it; after a move the app stops claiming it is registered, but nothing warns you until you look.
• ⚠️ It takes over a URL scheme belonging to Bambu Lab's own farm client. A system has one handler per scheme. If you have that client installed, Bridge says so and will not displace it without an explicit tick.

BamDude Bridge v0.1.0-beta.1 (pre-release)

First build. Windows only — the BambuStudio integration it exists for was never implemented for macOS.

What it does

Registers itself as the receiver for BambuStudio's Send to Bambu Farm Manager Client, and puts the sliced plate straight into your BamDude library. The server side needed no new code: it is the library upload endpoint that was already there.

Downloads

• …-setup.exe — installer. Start Menu entry, uninstaller, and it fetches the WebView2 runtime if the machine lacks it.
• …-portable.zip — unpack and run. Does everything the installed build does, because registration is a button in the app rather than installer work.

The unversioned copies of each are stable links for pointing at from elsewhere.

First run

1. Server address and an API key. The key needs the library-manage scope, and nothing else.
2. Test connection — it checks the address, the key, and whether that key may actually add files to your library, so a green answer means the first plate will land.
3. Register Bridge as the receiver — one administrator prompt, for the single registry key BambuStudio looks for. Autostart comes with it.
4. Restart BambuStudio. It reads that key only at startup, so the menu entry will not appear in an already-open slicer.

Worth knowing

• Unsigned. SmartScreen warns on first run: More info → Run anyway.
• Closing the window hides it. The app lives in the tray; Quit there is the only real exit. Staying resident is what lets a plate reach the running instance instead of paying a cold start each time.
• A handover stays quiet unless it fails — the slicer is in front of you, and the confirmation you want is the file appearing in your library. Failures take the window. Everything is logged to %LOCALAPPDATA%\top.bamdude.bridge\logs\bridge.log.
• If you move a portable copy, press Register again. Registration stores the path of the executable that performed it; after a move the app stops claiming it is registered, but nothing warns you until you look.
• ⚠️ It takes over a URL scheme that belongs to Bambu Lab's own farm client. A system has one handler per scheme. If you have that client installed, the app says so and will not displace it without an explicit tick.