laid side-by side which actually is not profile nesting. There remains scope for waste reduction. Nesting software must take into account the limitations and features of the material and machining technology in use, such as: Machining cannot take place where the raw material is clamped into place; Some machines can access only half of the material at a particular time; the machine automatically flips the sheet over to allow the remaining half to be accessed; When punching, the width of the punch tool must be considered; Shearing may be permitted only in certain areas of the sheet due to limitations of the machinery (e.g. always across the whole sheet); Some cutting technologies (plasma) require some minimal offset between the parts; Nesting software may also have to take into account material characteristics, such as: Defects on material that must be discarded; Different quality areas that must match corresponding quality levels required for different parts; Direction constraints, that may come from a printed pattern or from fiber direction (graining); Front and back sides of the raw material; Many machine manufacturers offer their own custom nesting software designed to offer ease of use and take full advantage of the features of their specific machines. If a fabricator operates machines from more than one vendor, they may prefer to use an off-the-shelf nesting software package from a third-party vendor. They then have the potential to run jobs on any available machine, and their staff should not have to learn several different software packages. See also Material may be cut using off-line blanking dies, lasers, plasma, punches, shear blades, ultrasonic knives and water jet cutters. References Industrial automation Industrial processes