topic AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability in Modeling

AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Laszlo Nagy — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 11:08:35 GMT

This is good news, they believe in Open Collaboration just like GS:

http://www.dexigner.com/architecture/news-g20875.html

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Anonymous — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 15:27:25 GMT

Nice.

Thanks
Laszlo

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Mark Wallace — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 17:05:21 GMT

Thank you Laszlo...I was thinking of posting this myself and I'm glad to see you picked it up.

It's also here;

http://archrecord.construction.com/community/blogs/ARBlog.asp?plckController=Blog&plckBlogPage=BlogViewPost&newspaperUserId=ac946cd0-ba4a-4e0e-8da4-47c9e7c5d923&plckPostId=Blog%3aac946cd0-ba4a-4e0e-8da4-47c9e7c5d923Post%3a88f66b65-8cf9-4a5a-895a-fe9750f35772&plckScript=blogScript&plckElementId=blogDest

There is a link to the AIA position paper in PDF form.

It's a big deal when the AIA weighs in like this on such a matter. The 16 Billion in losses really caught my attention.

While this is not law, it provides us with a measure for dealing with our day-to-day work with projects, consultants, resources, suppliers and our resellers going forward. As a profession, we are not alone and the AIA has done a good job of enlightening all of us to the degree of wasted time we are all experiencing.

Reading between the lines, it appears that; Even if you have the biggest market share in the BIM world, interoperability is a must, not a luxury. Creating standards that ultimately become monopolies does not necessarily lead to better design or architecture.

It's human nature to do work-arounds. The AIA has measured the waste and I could do alot with that kind of money.

Mark

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

TMA_80 — Sat, 12 Jun 2010 18:02:54 GMT

Thanks Lazlo !

It would mean in that case that Graphisoft is leading the way then...(again i would say). This is a great news for Graphisoft (and us as well)...

Would that mean IFC will be developped more intensely than it was before.

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Rod Jurich — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 03:10:09 GMT

TMA_80 wrote:
/.......Would that mean IFC will be developped more intensely than it was before.

Yes, 14 does a lot to address this issue. 14 is shipping therefore you can check soon yourself.

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Rod Jurich — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 03:11:53 GMT

And also a view of the new IFC Translation Setup

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

TMA_80 — Sun, 13 Jun 2010 17:24:23 GMT

Hi Rod !

What I meant was "developed 'also' from other software compagnies as GS has, as you mentionned focused ( some, would say ...only) on this area for AC14...

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Anonymous — Tue, 15 Jun 2010 09:44:48 GMT

“The proprietary and conflicting nature of various software packages results in enormous waste and ineffectiveness, with approximately $16 billion in annual losses for the design and construction industries,” said Kevin Connolly, AIA, board member and champion of AIA’s interoperability efforts. “This is due to a lack of accurate and effective information exchange, and the AIA is taking a leadership role in seeking a solution to this costly problem.”

Really? Tell me about it.
Come on... We all know this. What we need is ACTION.
What is AIA doing to achieve this?... Are they lobbying on the congress?
AIA members deserve more than public statements.
Sorry for the rant.

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Anonymous — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 22:48:40 GMT

Braza wrote:
“The proprietary and conflicting nature of various software packages results in enormous waste and ineffectiveness, with approximately $16 billion in annual losses for the design and construction industries,” said Kevin Connolly, AIA, board member and champion of AIA’s interoperability efforts. “This is due to a lack of accurate and effective information exchange, and the AIA is taking a leadership role in seeking a solution to this costly problem.”
Really? Tell me about it.
Come on... We all know this. What we need is ACTION.
What is AIA doing to achieve this?... Are they lobbying on the congress?
AIA members deserve more than public statements.
Sorry for the rant.

I'm glad to see the AIA acknowledging the issue though their track record for driving industry trends is less than astounding. In any case the reality is that there are many of us in the trenches just making it work and getting the job done and this is where the interoperability rubber hits the road. It doesn't hurt to get cheered on though. 😉

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Laszlo Nagy — Fri, 25 Jun 2010 13:03:34 GMT

I have just found the file that contains the full AIA Interoperability Position Statement:

http://www.aia.org/aiaucmp/groups/aia/documents/pdf/aiab082297.pdf

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Steve Jepson — Sat, 26 Jun 2010 01:00:06 GMT

$16 billion in annual losses for the design and construction industries is due to a lack of accurate and effective information exchange?
Is that so? Is he equating hypothetical savings with losses or what?
How much of these “losses” is do the fact that the information he refers to can’t be extracted from the model?
I can’t help but notice how BIM software (ArchiCAD specifically) has made little progress in their ability to extract and process the BI.
This deficiency has been eliminated however, by inventing a new definition. In case you haven’t noticed, ArchiCAD is BIM “authoring” software.
The fact that you can’t get the BI out of the model and into useful formats is incidental. ArchiCAD is just for “authoring” the BI, not actually using it.

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Mark Wallace — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 15:44:58 GMT

Steve wrote:
$16 billion in annual losses for the design and construction industries is due to a lack of accurate and effective information exchange?

Yes...it's due to the incompatible 'data schemas' between the various programs. For instance, 2 weeks ago, I had a problem swapping an AutoCAD file/dwg with a consultant on a time critical deadline. What with correcting the files' formatting and the incidental communication back & forth to debug the format, the time spent was about; 5 man hours (x yours & their billing rates).

Steve wrote:
Is that so? Is he equating hypothetical savings with losses or what?

Not 'he,' but they; this is a committee within the AIA.

In most practices, we expect to reduce the amount of time spent doing things as we get better at doing the same procedures. I remember hand drawing so my reference goes back many years. Most successful firms benchmark their tasks in terms of time & then note how new technologies affect the project's 'real time' to develop relative to similar projects.

When software actually introduces MORE complexity and time into the the work flow, efficiency and productivity suffer. To be honest, my productivity has suffered due to several annual 'relearning phases' of ArchiCAD's changed graphic interfaces, 'new features' that I don't need, features that don't work (like Stairmaker) and other topics discussed in far greater detail elsewhere in these forums. What's gauling & a little embarrassing is when my data or my consultant's data can't be utilized to complete our respective design work; others are then affected esp. when we are trying to work as a real team.

This report gives me some knowledge and strengthens my resolve to insist on compatibility as the Architect/Project Info Manager of my projects. Architects must do a lot of advocating and managing data files has supplanted 'drawing management' with some new and interesting challenges. Despite its problems, ArchiCAD is still ahead other software.....for now.

Steve wrote:
How much of these “losses” is do the fact that the information he refers to can’t be extracted from the model?

Well, I'm not sure what kind of practice you're running, but the next time you receive a file from a consultant that is not compatible, measure or note the time dealing with it, the time coordinating matters until they are resolved and how long it takes before you can continue working.

It's what the AIA surveyed many firms over the last year.

Steve wrote:
I can’t help but notice how BIM software (ArchiCAD specifically) has made little progress in their ability to extract and process the BI.

It's compounded by the fact that more and more consulting firms are now using many different types of BIM or CAD software with '3D data schema' that do not 'play' well with each other. Getting the files usable does waste a lot of time.

Steve wrote:
This deficiency has been eliminated however, by inventing a new definition. In case you haven’t noticed, ArchiCAD is BIM “authoring” software.
The fact that you can’t get the BI out of the model and into useful formats is incidental. ArchiCAD is just for “authoring” the BI, not actually using it.

I'm not sure that inventing a semantic term 'authoring,' will make the problem go away. Right now, I'm looking forward to another 'file-go-around' early next week when a consultant sends me something 'they' think will work with the version of ArchiCAD that I use. Testing takes way too much time that our clients won't pay for. We have to simply work things out as we go along. So... We'll see what happens.

Just a friendly note to an interesting comment..... 🙂

Mark

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Steve Jepson — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 05:16:43 GMT

Have you tried the Solibri IFC optimizer? I have the viewer. It's great.

http://www.solibri.com/solibri-ifc-optimizer.html

Re: AIA Advocates for Open Standards in Interoperability

Anonymous — Wed, 30 Jun 2010 18:36:00 GMT

Steve wrote:
Have you tried the Solibri IFC optimizer? I have the viewer. It's great.

http://www.solibri.com/solibri-ifc-optimizer.html

Solibri is really cool stuff. The interface could use a bit of updating (it still looks a bit like MacOS 9) but the functions are fantastic. It seems to manage the speed of Navis but with full solids and IFC data (Navis is a surface modeler and the model data is pretty stripped down).

Solibri Model Checker can do really cool things like check for dead end corridors (exceeding egress requirements) and such. Definitely worth a look.