Frog Up or Down

I recently read an excellent set of White papers issued by the RIBA re planning, and its almost antiquated approach to both the application method and its use of digital drawings and the data it contain. Its not the first time I have approached this subject, but I was so pleased to see the article in the Vol 25 issue 2 issue of TcT magazine . The White paper which the link above takes you to, consists of several different papers all loosely linked on the subject of digital planning. Quite rightly the author takes a look at the actual application process and takes it a little further to look at the file naming structure, and the ability for search engines to find and load the application, not so simple in current planning sites. The use of Digital applications at planning will encourage Smart City's a reality, the video below I think shows a way forward. They mention City GML, and IFC, GML an open city standard, together with IFC and its open standard between the differen...

A single large construction  project is going to collect a lot of data throughout the design and construction phase of its life culminating with all the data it will collect during its operational life of say 60 years. but the types of data can easily be split split into 6 different types of data. When we look at all the data we generate for a building you might just look at it all and think we are entering the world of Big Data , but here we have to be a little careful on the word "big" as we compare different uses of the word Big, when we look at the  2560 terabytes of data that retailer Walmart collects every hour by capturing customer transactions, and the vast size of all the videos on /youtube although spread over many servers its estimated to be in the several Exabytes , by comparison Birmingham city Council in 2007 had 7 terabyte of storage just for there immediate data only storage needs for  roughly 35,000 staff, this probable That this doubled every...

How far can we take 3D, I had a conversation with a planning professor, recently, and he had no idea as to the use of even existence of Point Cloud, and was only just aware of how the industry is heading towards 3D and BIM, reason, he still received most if not all his planning applications the old way, simple elevations and plans. I started to explain how the industry is heading, the use of 3D and BIM how data rich our files are now, by just clicking onto any portion of the structure a full spec of that material will appear, why do I need to make flat 2D drawings. His first argument was the way they have a responsibility t the general public to take in comment, if they can't read the drawings,,,,, etc, my argument was to show a 3D image and compare it to a flat 2D elevation, the 3D image was easier to read. Next point cloud, again he was astounded that we were at such a level, as we all know the street scene to a planner is the first point of reference to a planning applica...

If we are to make use of the Internet of things, then the devices ability to access the internet and sent sensor data to the cloud, then this device from Particle.io , is a must. The Video from Scoble shows this technology and how easy it is to set up a specific sensor array and get this connected up so easily. It relies upon a battery and at least a 2G connection, and at about $2 a week its not that expensive to run, although they say a solar array is available. The video below is on Facebook, and presented by Robert Scoble, its a real easy system, so easy to update, and run. There are a number of tutorials to show you how to do things, for me though its a way of getting sensor data back to the building to integrate into the IFC data, cloud cover, temp, wind speed, etc. just drop down the menu bar on the top right of the screen and choose. Cool new IoT Dev kit from http://www.particle.ioFor makers to developers who want to build prototypes with connectivity built in. ...

The online paper by John Foley ,  ORACLE entitled " As Big Data Explodes, Are You Ready For Yottabytes? " is required reading to understand Big city data, the impact it will have and the actual size we are talking about. There are several links to other papers, which give depth to the subject, but I started making notes and went for over an hour just following up links, key words and concepts. You might think just what has this to do with Architecture and the Architectural Technologist, well we are the detailers, the designers of materials and their use, as we head further into BIM and the data it can generate, and the way this data can interact and generate its own data, ,,,,, need I go on, its a subject we need to understand now.