Reflection

This course was interesting and not at all what I expected when I enrolled to take the class. I was expecting more quantitative work with more homework and quizzes. I was pleasantly surprised at the way the course was run. I like when professors have the attitude that you get out of the class what you put in. It helps ease the immediate tension and set the term up nicely. I also enjoyed how the course set students up to learn more about intelligent systems, not just the math behind them, but exploring the new technologies that exist.

Being a part-time employee for an engineering firm, we heavily rely on AutoCAD Civil 3D as our base for all of our work. However, the company as a whole is making the push to start training employees on Revit. The first part of the course, where we reviewed Revit and made a family group was highly beneficial and helped me on more than one occasion in the work place. Completing that project gave me more information on the system and allowed me to be a step further in training than the rest of my team.

Even though our team doesn’t use sensors and data collecting software, learning about Microsoft Access was an interesting exercise for a project. I had never used the program before, but the tutorials were more than sufficient in helping students figure out their way around. In the future, I will be looking out for this type of software across our projects.

The individual or group projects was also interesting because of the concept behind it. In most of the courses here at Drexel, a lot of projects are dictated to students without the choice of topics. It was a nice change of pace to be able to select a paper versus deliverable and then also the topic of the paper. It was also nice that the submissions were spread out throughout the course, making it easier to coordination and spreading of the workload. Overall, I really enjoyed this class and the way it was run.

Comments:

Blog 6 - Course Reflection - Calvin Tang

This assignment required students to think about what this course has taught them and how it might affect their profession and future.

When I started this course, I was one of the people who assumed that the main topics would focus on how we may improve the user-experience of the clients or building constituents using new technology after a building has been constructed. So I guess I’m saying that I thought we were retrofitting buildings with new technology. I did not think that we would start integrating these technologies at the conception of the building.

AI generating building designs is a fascinating idea that I believe will make things more complex. But complex isn’t a bad thing. It allows for unique ideas to become reality.

Automation of building construction will lead to job layoffs. I cannot be so optimistic as to hope that we can save every worker’s livelihood by training them in handling machines. Only the most adept will be retained and the others will be fired.

Sensors have been important for a long time. The advancement of sensors in accuracy of lifespan will be crucial to gathering more data that we can use to change design codes so that future buildings can perform better. We can also use sensors to make user-experience in the building such as lighting and IAQ much better.

I am studying architectural and civil engineering with a concentration on structures. I think having BIM assist in structural calculations is a good thing as long as we can still check the calculations. The super complex structures that architects want will need to push the limits of structural analysis and design. For that purpose, we may need to make use of FEM. Moving forward, I think I need to quickly pick up a structural modeling software and become proficient with it.

B6 Course Reflection

As a civil engineering student, this is the first AE class I took. I think this class is especially helpful as I am preparing for my professional career as an engineering in the future. The course focused on several great topics that are essential for the future of the industry.

            First and foremost, the beam technology is an essential skill set as I am preparing for being a design professional. Professor Mitchell guided us to understand the use of the beam is powerful and will be a key tool to use in the future. The Revit assignment allows us to learn the different prospects of the tool. The use of both Revit and AutoCAD in the future is a good mix and can assist must of the projects in our future career.

            Database as another critical topic for this class is also beneficial for me. As intelligent building becomes more and more usual for the industry, understand the database tools will help me in the future of the designs. MS access is a great tool I used in this class and I know there are more and more database software with special focus. The project on the database allows me to study and give me an introduction for these kinds of tools.

            The term project as the final assignment is a great way to explore more on the subjects taught from this class. It is great for us to choose the specific topic we are interested in. For me, I chose the intelligent building versus the green building. At the end of the term, we are allowed to share our own research on our subjects benefits the entire class to be more informative on different topics the class introduced.

            The guest speakers professor Mitchell invited to this class is knowledgeable and shared a lot of their knowledge and experiences. It is always good for us to get more informative not only from the class but also from the professionals.

            Overall, this is a class I was always hoping to take during my years at Drexel. It provided us with the understanding of the impact of the technologies that are likely to produce significant change during our professional career.

Comments:

Yicheng: Just like you, I also didn’t know how to build a model using Revit prior to this class. I believe AutoCAD and Revit are similar and they can assist one another in the future designs for the project.

Hailey: I agree with you that the guest speakers are helpful in this class. Most of them are just a little bit older than us and they understand our needs and questions on the industry and our future career. They provided us with lots of additional knowledge to the course materials.

Matt: You mentioned some good points on the video professor Mitchell showed during the class. I remember the Boston Dynamics the most. These robotics will leave their footprints to all of the fields in the upcoming years and I hope construction industry can also benefits from it.

B6 - Class Reflection

Prior to taking AE 410/510, I was aware of Revit and databases as a concept, but I did not have a good understanding of what those systems were capable of.  Dynamo and grasshopper were also great software to get exposed to, as they allowed me to see where design firms in the architectural engineering and construction (AEC) industry is moving towards.  These, along with emerging technologies like robots, artificial intelligence, and augmented reality, can expedite construction projects and ultimately save money.

How this class exposed me to the Revit software I believe will significantly help me in the future.  At my job as a consulting engineer in the AEC industry, I am involved on some of Philadelphia’s largest and most forward-thinking design teams.  BIM360, as mentioned in this class, is one of the databases that I have been using, and on the same project, Revit is also being used.  Using these two software together has been extremely helpful, where Revit is being used in the design process and communication between various trades for coordination.  Then, BIM360 is being used to track problems with a system once it is installed on site.  Similar methods to issue tracking and design can be created using different software, but this concept is extremely helpful for projects with an integrated project delivery (IPD) method.  Dynamo and grasshopper are also clearly helpful to the design process, although for the specific career path that I am working towards, I do not believe they will be applicable.

Databases I believe are more applicable to my future career.  Occasionally there will be a project with hundreds or thousands of different buildings where data for each one must be collected.  Alternatively, there may be a single building, but thousands of photos that can be categorized by location in the building or what type of work is being photographed.  Larger projects like the second one mentioned can take years, or decades to complete, and with photos being taken daily, this can add up very quickly.  Towards the end of said project, finding specific photos can be difficult, but utilizing databases and queries, it could be possible to find specific photos much faster, saving time, and making the overall process less arduous.

Comment 1 Kunlun Ren:

Kunlun, it is great that you were able to get the opportunity to learn Revit and Microsoft Access.  I was in a similar situation where I have been putting off learning Revit and other software for years now, even though I knew I could learn it and that it would be helpful.  This was because I was either always too busy, and I knew that it was not an immediate concern, meaning I could learn it later.  I liked that this course forced me to learn the software, although I also wish that Revit were taught earlier in the AE curriculum at Drexel to help with junior design and senior design.

Comment 2 Harvin Bhandal:

Harvin, good points bringing up the novice level assignments versus the experienced ones.  I loved how Professor Mitchell allowed us to decide every assignment what level we were at, and be graded fairly and accordingly to our skill level.  Students who have used Revit over their co-ops obviously were more experienced with the software, and could complete the experienced task, while students like me who are not as familiar with Revit could do the novice level assignment.  The same can be said about databases.  This also allowed everyone in the class to learn more about databases and Revit, since everyone was able to expand into new areas of the software that they were unfamiliar with before.

Comment 3 Richard Kimball:

Richard, that is really cool that you have been teaching yourself to code and learn databases on your own.  I have also been meaning to begin watching videos online to teach myself specifically how to learn the command prompt on a computer, as I believe mass file edits are a common task that I will be given.  Learning the syntax and commands involved with the command prompt will help me streamline these processes, and save significant amounts of time.  Like you, I also want to learn databases and coding, and this class has been a great jumpstart to me gaining that knowledge.

B5-Reflection

AE 410/510, the Intelligent building, is one of my required class. My concentration is intelligent building for Architectural Engineering as well, so the knowledge for intelligent building helped me to get a basic idea about the technologies would be used in the future building. As a future engineer, this course gave me a primary guide for how the future building would be built, and how many other things I can do other than designing the buildings traditionally. The new BIM model programs, which were introduced in the course, such as the REVIT, Grasshopper, and other BIM programs, would be the most direct help for my future career because those programs would simplify the designing processes. Another helpful thing would be the MS Access database study. I am learning SQL by using Oracle in the information courses, and that was interesting as well, but the difference was that the MS Access was more intuitionistic and easy to be organized and edited.

I am always excited about learning new kinds of stuff. Now is the end of the term, I am still feeling interested in taking this course, but this course is not as simple as I thought. This does not mean that I do not like this course, but I do feel a little bit tired to do the projects and blogs. One thing cannot be denied is that those assignments and projects have helped me to learn more new stuff about intelligent buildings, such as the AI, the database, the BIM models and other interesting technologies. And to listen to the presentation from other professors and engineers were fun and expanded my mind. However, personally, some of the courses were too general to be followed, and there were too many pieces of information jumping up in each class, so it was hard for me to absorb those new bits of knowledge. In other words, I am not confident about this course. No detail was copied into my brain.

Besides those new technologies, I was expecting to hear something about how intelligent buildings would be improved, so that the negative effects from the building to the environment in the future would be decreased. But nothing was mentioned related to the future environment. This is a little bit different from what I thought about the intelligent building. Everything that I have learned from this course only benefits the people inside the building, but not outside of the building.

I am not a critic, and I do love this course, but, for personally, the course is a little bit hard to be patiently followed, and the project was too general to be focused. Hope these parts can be improved in future courses.

Comments:

Tsitsios: Yes, the BIM programs and the MS Access database were the most interesting and helpful things that we learned from this course. These can help us a lot for our future career.


Ren: You are right. The BIM model can simplify the engineers' lives, and there are many other BIM model programs in the business, which might be much more useful than the Revit in some specific categories. The database study will help us a lot for organizing. And, yes, to learn new knowledge from other professors is interesting and beneficial as well.

Laney Fries: Same, I am planning to study construction management in graduate school. The information from this course was a little be complex, but this should be similar to our future works, such as construction, operation, renovation, and demolition. I do agree that the BIM and the database study were the most important and interesting things we learned from this course. And, yes, to learn new knowledge from other professors is interesting and beneficial as well.

B6 - Course Reflection

Throughout this course, there were very interesting topics brought up that, in some way, are relevant to either what many of us plan on doing or connected to what we’ve learned about so far at Drexel. I really enjoyed how many of these topics weren’t brought up or included in other classes but are still important to discuss as they are relevant to what we will be getting into with our careers. One thing about this class that I found to be the most useful was bringing in the guest lectures- I think this is something that’s often overlooked in many classes, but having people who do the things we talk about in the class for a living gives us the opportunity to see what they do (and what we can do) and ask questions if it’s something we also can see ourselves doing. I know we had quite a few guest lecturers come in, but I would have been happy to see more as well. I think they bring something unique and all have different points of view, and especially in a class where we have this floating idea of what the future of design/technology/etc. will bring, hearing other professional opinions on that topic was interesting.

One of the topics in this class that I found the most interesting was Revit and BIM. With his being the way most of the industry is moving, I think it’s very important that we get some sort of introduction to it. That being said, I wish there was a lot more time (in all honesty, a full course) that talks about Revit and adds in learning the idea of BIM even more. My co-ops have been a little bit different from most engineering co-ops as I have not had the opportunity to spend a lot of time in design programs like Revit or AutoCAD. I feel like this has held me at some sort of disadvantage when it comes to what many (and most) Civil Engineers are able to do. Having Professor Mitchell twice and him including the Revit introduction has helped me remember the program, but also continue to learn from it. I also think it was great to include the topic and an assignment on databases, because not everyone has the opportunity to learn about how useful they are. I’m currently taking a databases class because of my concentration, but because it is in the College of Computing and Informatics, it’s not geared as much towards engineering students and specifically how engineering students can utilize databases. Having this additional topic helped with my understanding of databases and how much they beneficial they are. I wasn’t expecting to get a lot out of the class, simply because it seemed like more of a “what could happen” continuous discussion, but the assignments, blog posts, and the guest lectures helped everything become more relevant and interesting. After graduation, I plan on working in construction management, which is another reason I wasn’t sure this class would help, but this class really tied in so many different subjects (including construction) and made me think just a little bit more about where the industry is going and how it will change going forward with all of this technology.

COMMENTS:

Maalik Kaptue – I totally agree that the sensors and robotics portion of the class was super interesting. That’s really what pulled together the topic of Intelligent Buildings with construction and engineering, which is one of the things that peaked my interest. I also had a co-op with the city, and after this class, I’m beginning to think a little bit more on how the future of technology will change how different sectors such as the Streets Department are run.

Hailey Ihlow – I also agree that the classroom setting was not conducive to how the course was set up to run. It’s unfortunate we ended up in the room, but I think the class was able to work the best it could given the environment. I also agree how this was a really nice change of pace from the other CIVE based classes – it’s nice to have it more discussion-based courses and especially for seniors, it provides more of an opportunity to consider everything that may happen in the future.

Jenny Fretta – I think it’s great that the different topics and assignments included in this class helped you in many ways, like senior design and your future career. The different subjects makes you think about how this fast-paced technology is changing our field so quickly and what’s the best job to get into that can still be around in a couple of years, as opposed to eventually being done through AI. This class also made it interesting to think more about what the future holds, which is fun.

B6 Course Reflection - Alkiviadis Tsitsios

AE 410, Intelligent buildings has been a very beneficial course to me. Because of technological advances, the building industry is changing. The purpose of the course was to help us understand how these technologies affect the future of our professional career. In terms of design, construction, operation, renovation, and demolition, AE 410 has helped teach the role of information technology in these aspects. Through the review and discussion of articles, many topics have been touched on. The class has reviewed how BIM affects all parties of a project, like owners, architects, engineers, and contractors. It allows you to communicate with all parties, and eases the access of shared information. Additionally, the class discussed BIM technology’s relation to other drafting programs, like AutoCAD. Not only did the class discuss BIM technology, it also discussed database software. In particular, its relation to BIM, and in design, was emphasized.

One of the goals of the course was to become proficient in Autodesk’s Revit. I believe that after this class, I am much more seasoned in the software. There were various assignments and tutorials that forced students to become accustomed to its uses. These tutorials and assignments allowed me to become more familiar with the software. Previously, I had glanced upon the software, and was slow at navigating it. Now I can make my way around, and I am aware of the locations and functions of many of the tools. Additionally, training was instilled for the Database software. Assignments regarding this were helpful. While the training in both softwares were helpful, I believe with slightly more tutorials, as well as some more tutorials on how to correlated BIM with Database software would have been helpful. Nevertheless, the knowledge that I have gained through the assignments and the class will be carried on with me through my career. My first real exposure to BIM and Database software has been through this class. As I progress in engineering, I can always come back to the information that I have gathered in this class for reference. The course has been helpful in understanding the conceptual reasoning behind the use of the software, as well as administering the software for technical use.

ROBERT BORRELLI
I agree that the course is not what I expected. I am glad that we discussed and trained in the softwares. Initially, I thought that it would be an informative course, littered with structural calculations and a buildings relation to technology. The class did emphasize a buildings relation to smart technology, but through demonstration, rather than lecture and speeches.

HANYAN CHEN
Before the course, I already understood that there existed “smart” technology. I did not understand that an entire building could actually be intelligent. Even through the final project, there have been many instances shown where a building could indeed be intelligent. Not only is there automation in manufacturing, and advancements in robotics, there are also advancements in building, and that is intelligent building.



MAALIK KAPTUE
I agree that this course is a lot different than most. Like you said, I am also used to courses which emphasize heavy calculations. It was refreshing to take a course where guest speakers were frequent, demonstrations were helpful, and the ability to be creative was emphasized

B6-Reflection to course AE410/510 Intelligent Building

Reflection to course AE410/510 Intelligent Building

As an Architectural Engineering student, I was been wondering all the time what does intelligent or digital building means. As a senior at Drexel, I am anxious for the year about where I should go for graduate school or what kind of job I am looking for. This course actually gave a really great basic guidance for digital building students like me. It introduced BIM software, like Revit, and database, like MS Access. It is really helpful for students who does not have any experience about these software. It is a chance for them to get one step into the BIM field and it is also a good start for using Revit and Access with a detailed guidance. For students who have used Revit, it is not as effective as those novice students. Though we learned a bit deeper in these software, I still think these course should be recommended to take once the concentration has decided. It will be a great introduction course for those digital concentration student, rather than being an isolated course that has students from different levels.

About the course, the content is great about the future of BIM, robotics, sensors, etc. A lot of materials are not being touched in other courses for Architectural engineering students. Focusing on future gives this course a really deep impression that also encourage students working in this field. The presentations that guest speakers provided are impressive and insightful especially for senior students like me. It really helps me to understand the current situation of the field and what direction it could go. For me, as an international students, I also thought a lot about the BIM trends overseas. It is interesting when I compare the current situation of BIM technology between America and other countries, which also helps me to find the future career directions.

Comment:

Kaptue, I totally agree with you that it is important to see if the cultures in the firm is moving forward or not. Being a new vital force to this industry, it is also our responsibility to help companies move forward and catch the pace of the technology.

Jenny, you have mentioned that possibilities are endless. It is true that we are responsible to ensure the safety when we develop the technology. It is great to see that you can apply these concepts to your career in a close future.

Sean, I agree with you that intelligent building still has a long way to go that the cost, poor coordination and low desire will be the challenge for developing the technology for intelligent buildings.

B6 - Course Reflection

For this course AE510, it left me with a deep impression. I have learned a lot of new design techniques and architectural concepts. I think it will be very helpful for my future development in this industry.

Before this course, I only can use AutoCAD to design buildings or draw something. The professor taught us our new design software, Revit, and the new concept, BIM. This is a new tool for architecture, engineering and civil engineering. It is easier to design the building we want. When I saw this software first time, I was very interested in it. In the class, we simply learned the basic operations of Revit and designed a simple architectural model. For this software, I also learned more and used Revit to complete my final project: based on the existing building model,  re-optimize the building structure and reconstruct a new building model.

About BIM, I think the most important advantage of it is that it provides a visual idea for people to see a three-dimensional solid object. In the BIM building information model, the results of visualization are not only that it can be used to display the renderings and report generation, but also that the communication, discussion and decision making during project design, construction and operation are all under visual state.

In addition, one interesting part of this course is that sometime there are alumni or other scholars in our industry who would come to the course to share his or her thoughts with us. This gave me a lot of insights and deepened understanding of this industry. I remember the Sensors Introduction from. He used smartphone as an example to introduce a variety of sensors and their relationship.

In this course, I also learned a lot of new concepts, for example: BIM, 3D printing, sensors, SQL, etc. Although we have not specifically studied the technology, we have a basic understanding of these concepts. Every week we need to read a lot of papers, and then through the blog, we have published some understanding of these technical concepts, and communicated with the students.  For so many new concepts, I am still most impressed by the robots that the first class professors showed me. The human-like robots from Boston, like the actual human movements, are automatically adjusted to balance and calculate the motion path. This makes me wonder about the drawbacks of these technological developments: will it happen that in one day robots will replace humans? Will there be a lot of people who lose their jobs because of robots? How to prevent these technologies from being used in bad thing, such as terrorist attacks or even non-peace wars. I believe that while learning these knowledge, we also need to consider about humanity and morality.

Comment:

To  Harvin Bhandal:

I agree with you the last paragraph of the content. As you said, the development of the technology industry will absolutely benefit people. But I always believe that while developing new technologies, we must always be based on human beings themselves. For a simple example, weapons used to protect our personal safety are correct, 100% correct, but some lawbreaker will use it to hurt others. So we must prevent weapons from being gotten by these bad people. For this point, I just want to say that when we study new technologies, we must consider more comprehensive.

To Nick Maloney:

In your blog, you said that this lesson covers a lot of new concepts, which make us have more something to talk when we communicate with others. I think this is correct. After learning this lesson, what makes us different is that we have improved our knowledge and have different thinking about technology. There is no doubt that this will be very helpful for our future career prospects.

To  Matt Mullen:

That's right, I also agree with what you said: we can watch some instructional videos when we are doing Revit or database assignments. In the lecture, we always miss some knowledge, but if we have these videos, we can complete our work step by step according to the instructions of these videos. I think these video are very helpful for novices to learn.

B6: Course Reflection

One of the most important facets to remaining viable in a field driven by technology is the ability to react to changes in a dynamic field. Despite the fact that the AEC industry has typically been a slow-adopter of technology, it appears that these changes are coming and will drastically alter the way that design professionals approach their day to day work. Because of that, there is a pressing need for a prospective engineer to be aware of what could possibly be coming down the road in order to be well-equipped to take advantage of the opportunities that come with them.

This is where the AE 510 course stepped it. It had the ability of exposing me to new and old aspects of technology in the building industry, all the while projecting what the industry may look like in the future. Some of these technologies I was aware of, including BIM, the need interoperability in software and other aspects of design, and basic mechanism behind more novel methods of production such as 3D printing, sensor controls, and AI integration. Other aspects were new to me. The extent of robotics integration was especially jarring to see, as was the complexity of databases that controlled advanced BIM software. Admittedly, some topics felt at first glance as if they were overly ambitious and perhaps impractical. That said, knowing what research is currently focused on gives premontions for what may eventually become reality over the course of my career as cost and other hurdles are mitigated.

The benefit of this class was the variety that we saw, though there was a drawback in terms of the lack of depth in which we were able to explore certain topics. The variety was helpful in that it prepared us for the variety of careers that can come from an AE degree. Additionally, at this stage of my life I can not anticipate whether certain jobs or projects will require me to be conversational in some of these topics. It is useful to have a breadth of reference points for this purpose. The class also provided a springboard for looking at different research opportunities on your own. In my case, I was able to integrate faculty research into the topic of point cloud modeling to expedite modeling to structures using photogrammetry techniques. It fostered interest in different sensing technologies and the opportunities that exist with them. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, it also reinforced the idea that each technology has with it limitations that must be accounted for in design and in the evaluation of any product. Such an idea will help to ground interactions with vendors and clients who may have separate agendas.

Sean,

I agree with your point about the guest lecturers. It was very enlightening to see how some of the concepts that we were learning about in class were actually being applied. I thought it was also interesting to note the pace of changes in certain areas, and how they differed across industries.

Christian,

I think your conclusion about the practicality of the course is a good one. I think the choice in not diving too deep into any subject left us in a spot where we knew enough to be aware of what was going on in terms of technology implementation in the construction industry, but not enough to apply it very well.

Matt,

Your mention of Kayleigh’s lecture was a common one throughout these blog responses. Her introduction to Dynamo was an eye opening one that left me thinking about how the traditional roles of engineers will be changing over the course of our careers. I think that equipping yourself with literacy in programming is a valuable tool that will help you be adaptable and able to take advantage of changes in the industry.

B6: Course Reflection

I have greatly enjoyed this course. It has been interesting to attend every class and learn something new about the AEC industry and how new technology will change it. The knowledge gained from this course has influenced my view of the AEC industry and has displayed to me its potential moving forward into the 10 to 20 years into the future.

In particular, I found the database assignment to be useful and relevant. I am glad that I have now created a basic database and have an understanding of the basic functionality of databases, which will be useful when communicating with individuals regarding databases in my career. It is also nice to have a simple understanding of how online services like Amazon and Spotify, organize and store their information. Prior to this class, I had not considered the role that databases have in the management of building information. From our discussions in class, building databases are a crucial part of intelligent building and allow for more effective monitoring of system statuses by cataloging sensor measurements and building information. Effective databases, sensors and automation system combinations improve system monitorability and allow building managers to prevent problems before in the system before the problems can occur.

The database assignment required the creation of a relatively simple database, but it still took a considerable amount of time, planning, and set up to execute properly. In class Professor Mitchell showed us the database for a simple Revit family; the number relationships required for that simple family was staggeringly high and probably contained about one hundred more relationships than our simple assignment. The complexity of large and applied databases to be extremely overwhelming and confusing, but it is interesting to know that hundreds of fields, tables, and interconnected relationships make up the framework for the data we make use of today in the digital age.

From BIM and Dynamo to databases and sensors, the topics discussed in this class have changed my view on what an intelligent building is. There are a lot of factors and considerations that need to be made and continued from early stages of design to construction and building management. Intelligent buildings are obviously favorable and possible, but cost, poor coordination, and low desire to change impede the progress of intelligent building construction.

For my term project, I developed a Dynamo script to convert rooms in a linked Revit file to spaces. While not a complex script, the project was still challenging. I am glad that I decided to complete a Dynamo project; I am excited to start co-op and begin looking for tasks assigned to me that could be automated.

I also greatly enjoyed the guest speakers for this class,  notably all of the Drexel AE alumni that came to speak to us. It was refreshing to have lectures from AE graduates to give us insight into the jobs possible for graduates from our program. I enjoyed learning about each presenter's current position in the industry and was surprised and excited to learn that a lot of the technologies we discussed in class are being used by firms in effective manners.

Blog Post 6: Course Reflection

I did not have much of an idea of what the class would be like, but I am happy with what I got out of it. I enjoyed the fact that there was a wide variety of topics, especially ones that I did not know much about. I knew about Revit and Building Information Modeling, but I had not taken classes that discussed sensors, robots, or AI much at all. It was very useful to broaden my understanding of what goes into intelligent building and where future technology is headed.

I have a lot of experience with AutoCAD, but barely any experience with Revit. The Revit assignment was very helpful in getting me familiar with the program and the step-by-step instructions, as well as the video walkthrough, was very helpful. I would have liked a second part to this assignment that walked us through using Dynamo as well. The sensor database assignment was useful as well, both in creating a database in Access from scratch and from trying to find data on different sensors.

The lectures and videos on 3D printing, robotics, and AI were all very interesting to me. I had already seen some of the technology that was shown because of my personal interest, however, I had not been keeping up with the new developments. Being able to automatically 3D print buildings and other structures will cause drastic changes in our current infrastructure.

I enjoyed the guest lectures, especially Kayleigh’s because I had never heard of visual programming before. I had been thinking about looking for jobs in BIM so it definitely got me curious when she said, “BIM is dead.” However, this sent me down a path from Building Information Modeling to Visual Design and Construction to visual programming and generative design. Generative design was the topic of my project paper and I learned a lot about it.

Overall, this class was very helpful, and I will use what I’ve learned throughout my career. The discussions and blog posts taught me to research new technology and think/talk about what changes will occur. It is important to learn about future technology and stay ahead of it or else you will be left behind. 


Comments:
To Sean Reifer
I am jealous that you did your project on Dynamo. It was something that I wished the Revit assignment went into. I can learn it on my own, but as you mentioned, it is more challenging to work through it on your own. A video walkthrough detailing exactly what you are trying to accomplish is very helpful in learning quickly.

To Nick Maloney
I agree that we learned about a lot of different topics, but did not have enough time to go in depth with each of them. It was definitely useful to get some information from the various topics, but there are some topics that I wish we went into in more depth. I believe the idea of the project was to allow us to pick what topic we wanted to learn more about during the course and do our own research which worked well.

Yicheng Li
I also learnd a lot of new things about 3D printing, sensors, and databases. I agree that the blogs helped us learn about something new and write about them almost every week as well as read other people's findings. My project focused on generative design which could become a problem when it comes to reducing or eliminating certain jobs. However, I believe some jobs will remain and their tasks will be altered and some new jobs will be created due to the changes within each industry.

B6 - Course Reflection

As the term comes to an end, there are many things to reflect upon regarding this class. As a civil engineering major, I was a little intimidated going into this class. However, after a couple of weeks I realized that Dr. Mitchell does a great job explaining the different topics and takes it one step at a time. I thought this class was very thought-provoking, with a lot of discussions of not only what the future technology is, but the ethics behind it as well. It was interesting to ponder the future of augmented reality and its limitless potential. 

For the BIM and Database assignment, it was a great idea to have different submissions related to your experience in each topic. I was a complete beginner in these topics before AE 510 so the assignments for the novice tier were great introductory projects for me to work on Revit and Access. While they may have been "simpler" assignments than the experienced level ones, I still learned a ton and still had some challenges doing them, which I mentioned in the reflection papers. 

I found that the guest lecturers spoke with very relevant topics, and it was great to hear about the same principles Dr. Mitchell mentions during class from a different perspective. As someone who is always searching for more efficient methods of completing tasks, the topic of automation really resonated with me. I thought  about how drastically these technologies such as Dynamo could expedite certain processes. I believe there are always ways to improve a system, and this class showed me some of the technology people are creating to shift how the CAE industry works. 

My biggest takeaway of this class is that the type of technology I originally thought was decades away, or that was only true in science fiction movies is actually apparent today. We were shown lots of videos of robots, augmented reality and BIM implemented in today's world. It's crazy to think of how far this industry is advancing and the unique methods people are developing to benefit society. Overall, this class had very thought provoking assignments, was not too difficult as long as you put in the work, and inspired me to learn about new cutting-edge technologies.



Comments on others:


Robert Borelli

Your post was great to read, particularly as you are a computer engineering student. I agree with you that the assignments in this class were very informative and straight forward. Dr Mitchell really put the time in to this course to ensure we all had the proper resources to learn the content. When you mentioned your surprise with the use of software and databases in building designs, it really is funny how all fields of STEM work together.

Matt Mullen:

I agree and I wish we spent more time specifically exploring BIM and its capabilities in this class. A simple dynamo assignment (potentially as extra credit) would further my understanding of the subject and could be useful in the future for me if I never need to automate a process in Revit.

Alec Silverstone:

It's great that you still found value in this course even though you don't plan on directly using this information in the future. I agree that one of the overall takeaways of this course was to be aware of the ever-changing technologies and to search for innovative ways of completing tasks.

Blog 6: Course Reflection

My understanding of this course was that it was a first step in future-proofing my career without spending too much time on overly speculative guesses. Through reading assignments and lectures I learned about the past and present of the AEC industry and the tools it uses. This established a base understanding for the course to build upon with realistic predictions of what the future might be. The projects in the class were key to solidifying my understanding of the material. I found that the main topics of the course that have stuck with me are databases, sensors, and automated design tools like Autodesk Dynamo.

Before taking this class, I was not fully aware of how the industry had undergone significant changes with the advent of computers and new software. I did not fully appreciate the differences between CAD programs like Autodesk Inventor and BIM programs like Autodesk Revit. Now that I understand how a BIM program works, I could better understand how up and coming programs like Autodesk Dynamo work. I can see myself using Dynamo in the future, which is partially why I chose to work with it for my class project. Working on the project taught me a lot about computer troubleshooting both within and outside of the Dynamo interface. I would like to have spent some time in class learning Dynamo since it was somewhat difficult to pick up on. Regardless, the class served as a valuable introduction to Dynamo.

I wasn’t as taken with databases, but I still see value in them as they are an essential part of many other topics in the class. As Dr. Mitchell told us, BIM is a database at heart, so understanding the structure of a database is essential to coding in programs like Dynamo. The database project helped me understand the structure of databases and good practices in creating them. Beyond BIM, I found the use of databases in conjunction with sensors to be an engaging topic. Databases are a key component to many of the other topics covered in this course and I believe that they will continue to become more important to the AEC industry.

Sensors and intelligent buildings were very interesting to me and I agree with Dr. Mitchell: they will gain traction in the AEC industry in the near future. I think I learned the most about the proper use of sensors in intelligent buildings from Travis Peyton’s lecture. The importance of proper building maintenance and how a well-designed building would be useless without it was a bit of a shock to me. His presentation had a lot of practical knowledge and was eye-opening. From what I learned in class, I believe that sensors will eventually be very important to proper maintenance of a building and could provide valuable data to which can be used to improve building design. I would have liked to learn more about programming controls that use this data to optimize building performance and diagnose building health, but I understand that would likely require a fair amount of prerequisite knowledge. Overall, I found that sensors were an engaging part of the course and what I learned about them will be useful to me.

Knowing how the industry you plan to be a part of might change in the future is essential to any professional. This course offered a good look into that future and gave me a chance to develop relevant skills.

Ren,

I agree that briefly using programs like Revit was a great part of this course. In my case, I have had a fair amount of experience with Revit, but I think it was useful to have a refresher on it to keep me from losing skills. This class is one of the few times we are exposed to a nearly ubiquitous software within our college education, so I am happy to see that you learned a lot about Revit from it. I was a bit less familiar with databases, particularly Access, so I learned a fair amount from that part of the course as well.

Alkiviadis Tsitsios,

You are right; a little more description on how BIM uses databases would have been helpful. I had learned about it mostly from what I read for one of the posts, but had trouble sorting through the huge amount of information presented to me. I see that as engineers who simply use the software, we might not have a chance to use that information, but I still would like to understand it nonetheless.

M Kaptue,

I agree; this course has done a great job of showing us firsthand how the AEC industry is changing. I’ve heard about some of what we covered in class before, but I did not realize that it was something that could potentially become common while we are still working. This class brought the nearness of the future in perspective for me. I am thankful that I was able to take a class like this because I now can see these changes and help to bring them about, making myself an asset to businesses.

Nick Maloney,

You bring up a great point that I had missed: that there is a limitation to every technology. I had looked at this class with optimism, but I was remiss to not understand that all these new technologies and the technology we use today is limited. Not to say that you are being pessimistic; I would argue that your view is realistic. I’m reminded of the poorly maintained buildings that Travis Peyton mentioned. These new technologies will have issues like the technology we have today. This brings me to what I’d like to add to your point: people will also have to be able to troubleshoot those problems with new technologies. I believe that is where what we learned in this class will be useful.