B5 - Uses of databases in design offices

Use of Database in Design Offices

In B3, we did some research on the advantages of Revit/BIM. I found database is one of the benefits using Revit as design tool since Revit is able to generate tables of detailed information of various materials. Thereby, cost estimation is easier and more accurate. In addition, Microsoft Access is an application based on database management. It raised efficiency tremendously as the quantity of data goes beyond human’s ability. Another software I learned in Construction Management class is Primavera P6 that assists planning construction schedule. With the help of database built-in, we can make scheduling readily. Nowadays, nothing rely on computer technology can work properly without database, so does offices design.

When companies start designing offices, the software talked above has great possibility to be used. At first, Revit can quickly sketch a rough layout of the floor plan. Furthermore, it can automatically generate the bill of quantities because of the existence of database. For this reason, prospective clients are able to have a better understanding of cost ahead of time. Microsoft Access has the ability to systemize all kinds of information and pull out the specific one whenever you want. It works with Revit, that means, database in MS Access can be imported into Revit. Afterwards, Primavera P6 helps schedule works assigned to various groups of people. For instance, two processes cannot be done simultaneously, it will require you to set up priority so the later process will not start until the prior one finishes. When some human sources are not available during weekend or holiday, we can assign working days as we want thus the whole schedule will be recalculated automatically. By considering all sources and restrains according to database, it makes the final decision to approach critical path, the most efficient way to finish this project.

These are just part of applications of database in offices design. I believe there are already far more technologies used in designing process in the real marketing world. To sum up, people created database to take advantage of it. Database management will be a must-have skill in the near future.

Comments:

Jonathan Plotkin – I really like your post combining with your previous working experience. It gave us a clearer idea about how the knowledge we learned can be applied in the real job. You focused on the first co-op where you think is mostly related to database.

Mark Bancroft – As you are a frequent user of AutoCAD, you explained how database is used in AutoCAD step by step. You also talked some beneficial reasons to use database when doing designing work.

Jiaao Wu – The first look at your post gave me an impression that it is well organized since you analyzed reasons from three aspects: architectural, structural and HVAC design. I’ve never thought in that way. Nice analysis, by the way.

B3 - Advantages of Revit / BIM

What are the current advantages of Revit/BIM?

“BIM is poised to be a major innovation in architecture industry in the 21st century, and Revit supplies oxygen to this wonderful innovation. There are number of reasons behind the increasing acceptance of Revit software in architecture industry.”

Building Information Modeling is a revolutionary progress in Architectural Engineering and Revit. As a combination of BIM and 3D modeling, it has the highest market share in the pie of BIM software industry. The reasons behind its widely acceptance are as followed:

1.     Revit is not only a draft-based software offering simple geometry elements such as dots, lines and circles but also an efficient tool to create 3D walls, doors and windows. With this quick design, people are able to get a general idea at the early stage and try out different schemes.

2.     In Revit Architectural model, every element is connected with each other. Any components need modification can be changed accurately as well as their related components so it will avoid time wasting on dull repetition.

3.     Plan, section and elevation views make visual analysis more reliable. Designers can use the 3D model to determine materials, color finish, lighting layout, fixed facilities and pipelines etc. from design perspective, thereby check exact location of each component to ensure the quality of design.

4.     BIM database contains detailed information. As a result, generating a variety of forms is very easy. Designers can use it to estimate project budget and contractors can refer it to increase accuracy of material shopping list.

5.     Revit also allows multi-users work on the same project simultaneously and merge their changes so everything can be stored in a single file. This flexibility is what AutoCAD lacks.

Revit shows advantages significantly especially in large and complex projects. Many companies invest the Building Information Modeling for better design and documentation, but business benefits go beyond design. It wins work from marketing, has greater efficiency that increase profit margins and better insight that improves project quality.

References

“Top 7 Reasons to Use Revit”,

http://www.architecturalevangelist.com/tips-and-tricks/top-7-reasons-to-use-revit.html

Comments:

Jiaao Wu – Your conclusion talks about three aspects: more accurate draft drawing, more automatic adjust and more comprehensive export. I totally agree with your opinion. What’s more, your analysis is detailed enough to illustrate your idea with some specific examples.

Yu-Sen Liu – You talked about both advantages and possible future benefits of Revit including 3D printing, 3D Virtual holographic interfaces, and motion tracking interfaces. I was totally surprised at those applications you mentioned as I have no idea about virtual holographic at all. It makes me realize Revit is just the beginning of BIM. More complicated technologies will be applied with the help of BIM.

Justin Hileman – Your topic focused on similarities between Revit and AutoCAD, that is “point cloud viewing and editing”. These two programs are related because of their purpose and use. Meanwhile, you pointed out the differences, for instance, Revit allows users to estimate cost. Your blog shows me a new point of view than mine.

B7 Reflection Kevin Saldivar

This intelligent building course covered a range of interesting topics such as robots and sensors, but also provided insight into other areas such as green buildings and construction process.  My understanding of intelligent building was not very broad at first, my definition for intelligent buildings as described in post 1 was, “An intelligent building is a structure that can react to internal or external changes in order to regulate a process or system of processes”.  Basically I thought sticking sensors in a building to regulate something encompassed an intelligent building in its entirety.  I learned that it is actually a process that begins much earlier in a project during the design phase.  After this was established other areas such as construction or green building were taken into consideration.  These processes were analyzed and any areas that the intelligent building process could be applied to were discussed.  I have not seen the intelligent building process first hand at work yet, but can definitely see it being a large part of my future work.  It has not been implemented into my workplace most likely due to the smaller size of the majority of the projects.

There is no doubt that it will have a profound effect on my profession, and any design profession for that matter.  I think it will be imperative to at least have a basic understanding of where the field is now as well as what direction and where the field is heading in order to work effectively and efficiently.  There will also be more technology available in the future to complete more thorough inspections and condition assessments.  This will mainly be completed through the use of devices and not the process but is still important to consider.

B7 Course Reflection Bradanini

When I applied for coming to study at Drexel for the exchange semester, and I had to choose the courses, I was curious about the Intelligent Building course. It was the first time for me that within three different universities there was a course completely focused on the future of the sector. I was not sure what to expect from this course, I had some previous basic knowledge of BIM and sensors and actuators, and I thought the course was mainly on these two topics.

Now I discovered there are other things that can revolutionize the construction sector in the future. BIM and actuators are something that is already in current projects or buildings, and for sure the number of companies using this will grow in the next years. However, what I liked more in this course was the discussions during the first weeks of classes, about the robots and about how the sector will change in the next 50 years.

Another thing that I found important for a course like this is how lectures are structured. Professor Mitchell was able to induce a critical and creative discussion between the students. Since the students in this class have different backgrounds, these discussions allow the students to learn also from each other and not only from the professor. It is great how Professor Mitchell understood immediately what someone was trying to say and was able to explain it with easier words to the rest of the class.

The guest’s presentations were useful and interesting. Maybe the two about BIM was somehow repetitive and the last one about sensor and actuators was a bit demotivating, but it was good to have a different point of view from someone who is not from a big and successful company but tries anyway to change the world of construction only with hard work. Often it is easier to learn from a failure than from a success.

I was a bit disappointed about the group work. For me the assignment was not very clear and since I was not part of the senior design team it was tough to understand everything about their project. Fortunately my group mates were kind and they helped me with the analysis for the project.

Generally, I think Intelligent Building is a good course, I learned a lot and I got new ideas, mainly from the other students that can be great for my thesis back in Denmark and maybe for a start up after graduation.

I look forward for the last presentations today. I’m very curious what the other groups have done.

B7 Course Reflection Papadourakis

This course has had a profound effect on my profession and my future. I mentioned in my introductory blog post that I was excited to finally take an architectural engineering course at Drexel. I actually entered as an AE but switched to Civil during my freshman year. During my time here I became more and more convinced that I would like to be designing, renovating, or maintaining bridges after graduation. I think I gravitate towards bridges because they constitute one of the most “creative” forms of infrastructure. After taking this course I know that I want to be involved more in the design rather than the analysis of structures.  The Revit project combined with the presentation of guest speaker from BuroHappold introduced me to the concept of BIM. I think that being a BIM coordinator would be extremely fulfilling and I am looking forward to gaining more experience with softwares like Revit.

In addition, I really enjoyed the topic of my group’s final project. I had heard of 3D printing in the past but had no idea that the technology was being used in the construction industry. I’m extremely excited to see it take off in the next few years and the opportunities that will arise from it. Although we didn’t touch on it in our final paper, I recently read an article about how concrete printing could be used for building lunar structures. The idea is that the lunar soil could be used as the base material for a type of “concrete” that could be used in a 3D printer. I think it would be incredibly exciting to be involved in constructing structures on the Moon.

All in all I really enjoyed this class and I hope to take more AE courses before I graduate. AE 510 offered a bigger emphasis on design than my civil engineering courses and introduced many new technologies that are currently being used in the industry that I was previously unaware of.

Comments: 

Ilana Ritvalsky: I too learned so much about Revit during this class. I had heard of the software before but somehow I had never used it. I agree with the fact that it is a great tool that can be used to integrate multiple facets of a construction project.

Chang Qin: I hope Professor Mitchell chooses your group to present today because I am really interested to see what distinctions you found between Green and Intelligent Buildings. I too had some difficulties assigning families in Revit...hopefully it will get easier as we become more familiar with the software.

Liang Jinhao: I agree with your point about the technical tutorials being very easy to follow. It was awesome that Professor Mitchell took the time to record them so that his students would be able to learn on their own time in a comfortable setting.  

B7 - Justin Hileman - Group E

Course Reflection:
"Reflect on course and its effect on your profession andyour future"

For this blog, I will be reflecting on this course as a whole and discussing how this class will effect my future career.

First off, I'd like to say that this class was much different than I originally expected. When I heard the title "Intelligent Buildings" I was thinking a class where we would discuss how buildings have all of these different types of technology integrated to allow it to act intelligent. After the first class, I realized this class was actually about how buildings can be built intelligently, as well as the type of technology that is incorporated. This was a very interesting concept for me to think about. As a recent switch to the Digital Building concentration, this had me thinking about this more often. The classes required to take in this concentration are database classes and system analysis, which address issues of how to construct buildings through technology. There are a lot of databases that are used, such as BIM and how we had to write a blog post about how databases are used in construction firms or design offices.

Throughout this course, we discussed a variety of topics. I thing one of the most interesting things for me was creating the database in Microsoft Access. I have never done anything like that before so that was very cool for me and I learned a lot about how important it is to have individual tables that provided information, and then how it is pulled to other tables through queries and forms. It was very interesting to see how it all worked.

Another aspect that I enjoyed throughout this course was the discussion of sensors. I learned a lot more about sensors than I ever knew before. There are so many sensors that I did not even realize were considered sensors. There are sensors for pressure, temperature, motion, noise, etc. and how they are incorporated into buildings which help make them more intelligent.

There are many aspects of this class that I can be useful for my future profession and career. As we have discussed in class on many occasions, technology is a booming topic and becoming more and more prevalent in anything you do. Computers are being used for almost all types of design and this is done through the use of software and databases. This means that we are going to be expected to be able to use all of these programs throughout our career. I think this class as greatly improved my preparation for the future in the work-field.

Comments

In response to Drew Sivertsen, I completely agree with what you had to say. The use of BIM and technology is upon us today and is being heavily used throughout construction today. I also think that it would be very cool to work for a progressive company that drives through its use of technology and means a great future for digital building.

In response to Santiago Uribe, I forget to mention all of the guest speakers but you are totally right. They were so great to have to come in and talk to us because we were able to see real life experience on how these topics are being used in the field. I, too, enjoyed all of the discussions on BIM.

In response to Alex Nunes, I had the same thought about the class at first. I also liked be able to take this class so that we could learn more about important skills for engineering students. I also enjoyed having you as part of my group during the term because I was able to learn different aspects like how it relates to where you originally learned things like this and working in another country. It provided a great aspect to this course by being in groups and talking to other students.

B7 Course Reflection

I really enjoyed being in this course.  I originally signed up to take this course because it sounded interesting and I thought it would be about things like houses something like iron man's, except instead of a butler the computers would control the HVAC, lights and sound system.  While there was certainly applications like that in this class, like in my final project, I think that the value of this class was actually in learning about the types of things that make up intelligent buildings that most people don't think about.  For example, I would never have thought about BIMas being an integral part of an intelligent building, but after this class I can certainly see the value of having a BIM model, both in the design and construction, as well as during the life of the building and for maintenance.

Similarly, I think that learning about the technology behind the systems I will be using in my career is a great idea.  I enjoyed learning about the different types of sensors building management systems use to make their decisions, as well as the databases which make the modeling and BIM software I am used to work.  I think that it will help later if I have at least a basic understanding of how the systems work, as it may help when troubleshooting any problems I might have.  

The last thing I would like to say about this class is that I was surprised by the number of technologies and project ideas for the final project.  I know when we talked about the projects with our groups a few weeks ago I was surprised to hear about things like 3D printing concrete and the building management system to control the HVAC of a building.  I also really enjoyed learning more about the Bullitt Center for my project as well, and I definitely would like to learn more about the other Living Building projects that are happening right now.

Responses:
Pelisser - I definitely agree that I learned much more about Access than I ever expected to from this course.
Price - I agree that the guest speakers were interesting and definitely opened my eyes to many different professions which I had not thought about before, especially BIM coordinator.
Lui - I definitely thought that learning about the drones building things was really interesting as well.  I was especially interested since I had hear about the GPS driven bulldozers before, but I had never heard of UAV's being used in construction before, even though my dad had worked at a company which built them for the military before.