Showing posts with label law. Show all posts
Showing posts with label law. Show all posts

Wednesday, 16 March 2016

Standardised process for the sharing of product data

I see this a lot in the construction industry, a committee wants standardisation. The BIM Task Group in association with the Construction Products Association, BIM4M2 and CIBSE are looking to develop a standardised process for the sharing of product data, You have to ask why, does it not go against the very nature of the development of big data, what Hadoop, Hana and all the other new ways to view and analyse large datasets, which I might add do not need standardisation, rather the opposite.

Large projects need to establish data use before it gets to site, develop rules to show how relations are make and kept, data shared, looking to associations for advice not rules, but thats for an individual project, and it may change as new projects are started, adding the benefits of hind sight and advances seen in the industry, but thats for a good project team to sort out, not a committee.

I sit back an wonder who is pushing for this and why, I feel like writing a paper on this and submitting it, just to outline the danger of rigid control, which seems to be at the for front of the way BIM is being developed, at least in the UK. The USA seem to be a little more open and allow the system to develop on its own.

I had a similar conversation yesterday when I had a tech chat with the some colleagues re the use of Point Cloud and laser scanning, 3D CAD files, IFC, and how we can pull them together, and we have not even scratched to ground re data. As for planning don't even go there.

Are we not inventing a new way of designing and transmitting that design to the construction team, and developing the use of the data we generate, so why control that development with rules right at the start of its development. 3D its use of BIM, and the way we are using it must be aloud to develop on it's own, we the market place will trial and develop, look for new ways, pull in new methods, and most of all talk and develop. Adding rules now, just throttles any thought process.

I am open to the rules if they come in the form of an academic paper for all to see, read, and act upon, but free thinking and market development is the way forward.

You might notice I have not mentioned the law in this piece yet, the courts scare me, and I fear once they get involved because of a spat between contractor and who ever, they will impose rules without any thought to any one but the winning party, but I can live in hope here.

You can add the teaching of this subject, to the list of why I want a free and open development, I am supposed to develop young minds, teach them to think, look at whats happening, and add to the development, not sit there and say, ok we need to control with a few rules, might get out of hand here !.
I want to teach students to look at a 3D cad file and ask, what BIM information can I add that will increase the data pool, that some one will find useful, adding open industry rules that prevent this is wrong. But adding rules to a contract controlling a job is correct.

Food for thought I hope.

Todays photo has no relation to the subject, just a dining table laid for 6 for a dinner party. Notice the gap down the middle, ready for the Terrines. Wine to the far right so I can keep our guests topped up.

Tuesday, 22 December 2015

Computational Thinking

I have just signed up for a course run by Google called Computational Thinking, as if I don't have enough to do over the Christmas break, still I have no work to mark, just three planning applications and a building regs drawing to complete.

But what intrigues me about this course is that its there for free, and its a subject I can't ignore, we as technologists, spend so much of our time on computers solving construction problems by drawing them, but that if there is a better way to approach the problem. Our regulations, and here I talk globally, are complex, often require calculation and last but not least, understanding, some times the law is not quite clear.

And then there is BIM and big data, this subject on its own justifies my time here.

I also want to be able to teach the subject, so perhaps I can mingle with other like minded educators and see how they approach the subject.

So I thought, why not take a look at this course and see if I can learn something different that may help tackle the problems we face daily and approach it in a different way. after all, we all have quite powerful computers sitting on our desks, can we use them in a different way to find answers to problems, or perhaps not even use it, just change my approach to problem solving.

Thats it, my spare time over Christmas sorted,  I will let you know how I get on, I plan to tackle this in small chunks, say an hour each morning whilst I an keen, I am a morning person, I fade as the day grows so morning is best.

Until I find more out, I went to Wiki to see what it says about the subject

"Computational Thinking (CT) is a process that generalizes a solution to open ended problems. Open-ended problems encourage full, meaningful answers based on multiple variables, which require using decomposition, data representation, generalization, modeling, and algorithms found in Computational Thinking."

Sounds interesting does it not !, and the CPD is top notch.