this post was submitted on 06 Jul 2023
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Programmer Humor

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

CAD used to be digital abstraction of the physical media that is 2D drawings on paper, so XY is the plane of the paper going horizontal/vertical, and most detailing are in vertical cross sections so Y ended up being up most of the time.

The Z axis is then Frankensteined into the existing system to get a proper 3D representation, so it became the depth axis for the existing XY plane.

In Minecraft it's even more evident as Notch Frankensteined the Z axis into a game engine that's originally developed for side scrolling.