PDAL

What PDAL is

PDAL is free desktop software for processing and analyzing point-cloud data on Linux, macOS, and Windows. Its listed capabilities include point-cloud registration, classification, geospatial analysis, and conversion from point clouds to meshes. Registration supports aligning point-cloud data, while classification assigns categories to points. Geospatial analysis provides tools for working with location-based point-cloud information, and mesh conversion supports creating mesh output from point-cloud data. PDAL supports E57 and LAS/LAZ files, giving users several stated formats for importing or handling point-cloud datasets. The processing model is desktop rather than web-based, so use centers on a computer running one of the supported operating systems. PDAL has a free plan, with no paid pricing listed. For selection purposes, its defined scope is point-cloud processing, analysis, classification, registration, and mesh generation, together with support for the listed file formats.