--estimate-mode

--estimate-mode is a boolean flag (default off) that automates the two pieces of state the CLI cannot derive on its own when you slice a project against a machine it was not authored on: which filament presets to load, and how to describe the target machine's extruder and AMS topology to the flush estimator.

The flag is only meaningful in combination with a machine switch, meaning --load-settings must point to a different machine than the one embedded in the 3MF. The CLI enforces this: if the new and current printer names are the same, or either is absent, it exits with an invalid-parameters error before slicing begins.

The two automation steps happen at different points in the processing pipeline. First, if no --load-filaments paths were supplied, the CLI resolves a filament preset for each slot that was occupied in the original 3MF. It does this by extracting the base material name from the original preset (stripping the @... machine suffix), then looking for a matching preset in the bundled profiles/BBL/filament_full/ directory under the new machine's BBL tag. Resolution falls back through three tiers: (1) an exact name match for the new machine tag, verified by checking that the file's compatible_printers field includes the new printer system name; (2) a scan of filament_full/ for any file starting with the same base name whose compatible_printers field includes the new printer system name; (3) the new machine's default_filament_preset. Slots for which no match is found at any tier are left empty and filled by copying the first valid resolved preset, so slot indices remain aligned.

Second, for multi-extruder machines (X2D- and H2D-class) and multi-sub-nozzle machines (H2C-class), the flag fills the extruder capability fields the flush planner needs: filament_map_mode is set to AutoForFlush, and nozzle_volume_type is set to standard for each extruder. For multi-sub-nozzle machines additionally, extruder_nozzle_count and extruder_nozzle_volume_type are populated from the machine profile's extruder_max_nozzle_count. Then, for multi-extruder machines specifically (X2D- and H2D-class, where extruder count exceeds one), the per-plate AMS topology passed to the flush estimator uses 8 slots per extruder (vs. 4 without the flag) and an AMS descriptor of 1#0|4#2 (vs. 1#0|4#1), reflecting a richer assumed AMS configuration appropriate for estimation on a machine not yet physically connected. Multi-sub-nozzle single-extruder machines (H2C-class) do not receive the per-plate AMS slot or descriptor change.