To BIM or not to BIM?

In their technology quarterly, the Economist has an article on Building-Information Modeling (BIM). The article describes how designers are using technology to design new buildings. Rather than using Computer Aided Design (CAD) to create 2D drawings, these designers are using intelligent 3D models to assemble virtual buildings before the real ones are built.

There are several advantages to designing in 3D

• Complex geometries are much easier to deal with.
  
• Coordination between different building systems are easier to manage - beams and ductwork cannot intersect!
  
• The calculation of required materials and costs can be done at the design stage.
  
• Issues that may lead to problems onsite can be identified and resolved before construction starts.
  

The 3D design process reduces construction costs by providing a more accurate and precise set of documents from which to build. The number of issues that need to be resolved during construction are reduced. 'Extras' charged by contractors for onsite changes should be virtually eliminated. As an additional bonus, the ongoing maintenance of the building will be simplified due to the accurate 3D model that represents all of the systems in the building and includes full specs and parts lists.

BIM was first utilized for highly complex buildings, but is now becoming commonplace for more conventional buildings. Architects are finding substantial cost savings in the design process as well as in the reduction of construction costs.

Now to the question posed in the title of this post: should we create BIM models of existing buildings? There would certainly be advantages to having a 3D model with integrated system specifications. Ongoing maintenance costs could be reduced and the cost of future design changes should be lower if other designers can reuse these models. At Space Database, we have found that there are significant cost savings to be had from the creation and ongoing management of a conventional set of 2D CAD drawings as well as in the indexing and archiving of old technical drawings. Would there be sufficient additional savings to justify the cost of a full 3D model?

A 3D building survey would be expensive and it would require many different disciplines to model all of the various systems. It is unlikely that the ongoing operational cost savings alone would justify the creation of a 'post-construction' BIM model for most buildings.

But the situation may soon change. Software tools are improving, so the creation of models will become cheaper. The availability of ready-made 3D technical equipment and components from vendors will further simplify the process. The emergence of open marketplaces and open standards such as Google's 3D Warehouse will add more value to 3D information.

In the meantime, landlords should find out if any of their consultants are using BIM software for projects in their properties. It would be good to know if there are existing models out there.

For further reading, here is the Wikipedia article on Building Information Modeling.

Quintura

Here's a really cool new search engine.It works like a conventional search engine on one level in that it will return a list of pages that match your criteria. But it adds a very interesting and useful layer: a cloud of topics that it believes are related to your primary search. By clicking on each topic, new results are displayed.

And a really cool feature is that it can be embedded! Here it is:

Creeping Elegance

Every year our software can do more and more. We add more features, modules and functionality. It's great to be able to do more and to offer more ways to support our clients. But there can be a downside too. With more features there is more complexity. We now offer training and have help files. These weren't necessary when we were simply hosting lists of files.
There's a lot to be said for simplicity. In some cases, an improvement can be made by reducing functionality. Read what Evan Williams, co-founder of Twitter and Blogger has to say about adding constraints as a way of making tools more useful. The popularity of this tool is in how little you can do!

Web 2.0 Summit: Twitter Founder Evan Williams Preaches Added Constraints October 20, 2007
Evan Williams, co-founder of Twitter and Blogger, believes that developers should be adding more constraints to applications, ...

Traditionally, if you think about the development of desktop software, every new version has new menus and buttons. It feels great because you could do more and more stuff! But pretty soon, the interface becomes so complex that you can't find anything. Extra features impair the user's experience and performance.
In this context a better software has fewer features. I think Google has lead the charge here. Everything they provide is simple and clean and very easy to use. If you consider other tools like Skype, Twitter, Wikipedia and Facebook the common element is a simple uncluttered and well thought out interface.

Our goal in development should be to get rid of the help file. Put a great deal of thought and design into the application and give it a lot of power in the back end, but keep the interface as minimal as possible.