BIM! WHAT MORE?

[Anonymous]

This is meant to be the twin thread of "BIM? WHY?" for those who are in favour of it and want to share their view on how to improve it. Those who are not in favour of BIM may still read it, and mouthwater as they change opinion...

Then the question is, what more would I want in it? This is my answer so far.

- include a section on topography that would serve the obvious purpose in design: when drawing a slab, AC also draws the foundation by following the actual land, on the fly. This is not easy, as one may want to have two or three connected slabs, as they follow a hill.

- AC is able to draw all sorts of roofs on the fly. Let this feature be smarter. Given the geographical north and the slab (see above), draw the roof so that it is oriented towards the maximum exposure to sun light, for the purpose of solar panel installation. This would solve a pesky problem with all new constructions, at the click of a button.

- let interior design meet its next generation cad by adding constraints on object placement, constraints that apply locally to any designer in the studio. Let call the collection of these constraints, a style model. For example,

- I want all beds to have the head towards north.
- I want no less than 1.2m around any master-bed.
- I do not want to see the dining table in front of the main entrance door.
- I do not want to see the toilet when I open the bath-room door. For example, if the door opens to the left, I want to see the washbasin on the right and the toiled on the left.
- and so forth

This is possible by adding a relevant option to the relevant object, where I can specify the parameter. However, one may forget about it, and thus one would rather set them all on a separate page. The collection of all these constraints defines a style model that applies to the design. Style models are not meant to be unique. For example, I would dream to have Feng Shui or other similar "philosophy" reduced to a set of constraints into a style model, and have AC enforce them on the fly.

Now it's time for coffee...

Robert Hunter

[Anonymous]

BIM! WHY?, the BIG BIM picture, BIM! WHAT MORE?

All vaguely amusing but IMHO far off the point. Building INFORMATION modeling is only at the edges about fine renderings. Want a fine rendering or a "Dwight illustration? I'm sure he's available. In my 25 years of practice I have probably not had a half dozen occasions to need that type of service.

The promise and hope of b-INFORMATION-M CAD is to help us deal with the other 99.9% of the project.

Whether that remaining .1% is your fine BIM rendering or my cocktail napkin sketch augmented with avatar arm waving, as long as the client smiles and shakes our hands that is all that is necessary at that stage of the game.

IMHO those who do not understand this, either haven't played the game or are playing some other game that I'm not involved in.

[Karl Ottenstein]

jdk wrote:
The way to go with ArchiCAD, in my opinion, is to replace the internal rendering engine with a well-written interface to external engines, and let people free to purchase whatever rendering engine they can afford. ....

Bob, oh poster from an obscure black-listed Italian IP address but with excellent command of the English language:

Have you looked at the various ArchiCAD software development kits to accomplish some of your wishes? In particular, the rendering devkit? These kits and others allow 3rd parties to add functionality to ArchiCAD.

As one of the verbose members here, but one who only sticks his head in from time to time now, let me say that I believe you are getting the response you are receiving - rather than serious discussion of the future of BIM/AC - because you seem to be a bit naive about what is required in a 'typical' architectural workflow, which things are essential for that workflow that are missing in AC now (that are far more basic than what you mention) and, do not seem to have a good sense for where limited dollars should go for the future development of ArchiCAD. Practical, commercial software development is rarely done in a cash-flush environment and so hard choices are part of the evolution of each new version.

But, to seriously address a few of your suggestions... Constraints such as those in Revit can be extremely useful for enforcing design or code rules. Personally, I don't need wall-floor joint constraints, but I'd like to have code-enforcement ones, such as enforcing the minimum side-to-side and front clearances for toilets as a small example (since you brought up water closets).

Other constraints that you mention, such as the ones closely related to Feng Shui, the roof alignment (solar) thing, and the auto-foundation don't pass muster with me as design is a lot more than making a box work. For example, the roof alignment idea would force the ridge in one direction (presumably east/west) for solar panels even if the shape of the house made that direction a very peculiar choice? Better that the designer be cognizant of solar concepts when laying out the original footprint isn't it?

2 cents for now. Back to work. Do take a look at the dev kits.

Karl

[Erika Epstein]

Karl wrote:
Bob, oh poster from an obscure black-listed Italian IP address but with excellent command of the English language:

Karl

Well said
How did someone with a black-listed IP address get through?

[Anonymous]

Karl, oh Karl, where were thou?

Re: the IP address.

I use TOR, so I can't tell which address I am using. It may be hitting Italy for a while, then move to China, and so forth. I am still sitting in ... sipping tea.

I wonder how you managed to read it. Are these messages posted to you via e-mail and headers? Do you also get the edited versions?

>As one of the verbose members here, but one who only sticks his head in from time to time now, let me say that I believe you are getting the response you are receiving - rather than serious discussion of the future of BIM/AC - because you seem to be a bit naive about what is required in a 'typical' architectural workflow, which things are essential for that workflow that are missing in AC now (that are far more basic than what you mention) and, do not seem to have a good sense for where limited dollars should go for the future development of ArchiCAD. Practical, commercial software development is rarely done in a cash-flush environment and so hard choices are part of the evolution of each new version.

It depends on how much work do you have, and how much you are paid for it. When you start having clients that pay 150.000$ for one bathroom, you start seeing things from a new perspective, and the last thing you want is to loose such clients. If they want photorealistic rendering, for example, you want it too. So, I do not know what your "good sense for" "limited dollars" is, but I certainly know my own.

>But, to seriously address a few of your suggestions...

... ok

>Constraints such as those in Revit can be extremely useful for enforcing design or code rules. Personally, I don't need wall-floor joint constraints, but I'd like to have code-enforcement ones, such as enforcing the minimum side-to-side and front clearances for toilets as a small example (since you brought up water closets).

OK. The WC was just a simple example. The gory point is the absence of high-level constraints in the present BIM, contraints that would help a lot. I understand that people may not see it, but I do not feel to apologise for my vision.

>Other constraints that you mention, such as the ones closely related to Feng Shui, the roof alignment (solar) thing, and the auto-foundation don't pass muster with me as design is a lot more than making a box work. For example, the roof alignment idea would force the ridge in one direction (presumably east/west) for solar panels even if the shape of the house made that direction a very peculiar choice? Better that the designer be cognizant of solar concepts when laying out the original footprint isn't it?

The correct roof alignment does help a lot with energy analysis. If the roof faces east-west, but the optimal orientation is south-east, the engineer is not going to be happy and the client will be upset for the extra cash needed to adjust the roof, if possible at all, and the additional panels. I observed that AC10 sets the roof alignment arbitrarily; the user is not queried about possible options. If the direction needs to be perpendicular, then we are talking about a wall, not a roof, isn't it? AC10's BIM aims at energy analysis too, via various add-ons. The roof alignment is not devoid of merit on this problem.

>2 cents for now. Back to work. Do take a look at the dev kits.

OK. Thanks.

Bob

(edited)