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.

Blog #5: Uses of databases in construction firms_Wenhan Fu

Database can be defined as an organized collection of data. In modern society, we usually refer it as the web-based database system. The advantages of it includes but not limited to the ability to process huge volumes of data; sharing between multiple concurrent users and lastly, minimize the human errors.

There are three most popular and widespread web-based database system in use. In the essay “A Web-Based Database System for Managing Construction Project Knowledge” from Belize Ozorhon et al, it stated that the three most commonly used systems are “the fee-based project management service, the build it yourself solutions and the web-enabled software for the construction industry” (Ozorhon, 2014). Each of them has its own advantages and disadvantages in their own prospective and are suitable for different types of company. For example, the fee-based project management services which is provided by an IT company, has advantages include low cost, need for less IT experience, however, there are also limitations regarding the volume of the data and others, this system will be more fit to the startup companies. On the contrary, the build-it yourself solutions allow the larger companies to process more heavily sets if data. It has its own limitations still including the investment requirements of the application, outsourcing and long development cycle.

To sum up, database is a modern technology for construction industry as well for the future to handling the large amounts of data. It will provide huge assists in multiple prospects. However, the limitations still exist. The main obstacle for the development of the databases is the types of databases has it own focus, and some of them will abandon some of the fixture in order to stand out in other criteria. The future development of the database in construction industry will be hugely focusing on the balance of the database and less complex for the none computer specialists.

Citation: Ozorhon, B., Karatas, C. G., and Demirkesen, S. (2014). “A Web-based Database System for Managing Construction Project Knowledge.” Procedia - Social and Behavioral Sciences, 119, 377–386.

Comments:

Harvin Bhandal: Your post on the relational database theory is interesting. It is unexpected the Retional Model was created way back to 1970. Also, there organize structure is also remarkable and still helpful in nowadays database development.

Yidi Li: My post has the same topic as yours. It is interesting the construction industry is one of the field databases actually can help a lot. I think the database will connect the industry even closer and we all can be benefit from it.

Maalik Kaptue: Your post give me a better understanding on how the database can help the design specialists. Indeed, even using the Revit to develop a project contains using the database. The development of  the Revit community is also the development of the database for the design firms.

Blog 4: Project Outline

My topic is discussing the comparison between Intelligent Building and Green Building. In my point of view, the future goals of the construction field will be mainly focused on two directions. Intelligence and environmentally friendly. The explore of the similarity and differently will assistance our industry to better future development.

First and foremost, define both two concepts are important. As Dr. Mitchel stated in the first lecture, the definition of the smart building varies so is the green building. In order to develop the project, properly define both concepts will be the base stone for the project delivery.

Afterwards, the project can be divided by several prospects. For instance, the subdivides may include but not limited to the building systems, types of buildings, construction stages and more. The similarities and differences then can be discussed with more depth and focus.

Moreover, for better develop of my paper, next subject I will be focus on is the discussion about their benefits and limitations, what are the benefits in common that is the characteristics for both? What are their individual benefits? Also, the connection between them as well. Also for the contrary, the limitations will also be included.

The challenges I will be facing priority is to find the borders between intelligent building and green building. It will be challenging to clearly stated the line. Frankly, some of the border is not clear at the first place. The other challenge is avoiding staying too general for my paper. Narrower and more insight will be my goal.

In conclusion, my goal for the project is by digging in to the definition of intelligent building and green building, find their commons and similarities as well as their differences. In addition, their conjunctions and differences of the benefits and limitations.

Comments:

Laney Fries: Your outline is clear in my point of view. AI vs. Green is an interesting topic as I think they can assist one another. Your previous experience in LEEDs will certainly help you in the approach of the project, but I think it will be better if do not limited to their standards.

Jenny Fretta: Your project related to Revit Families design is interesting. It is a nice way to explore more of Revit. Dynamo will be challenging indeed for beginner, use some resources outside the department might be helpful to your team.

Nick Maloney: Your continuing design for your project is a good choice for this project. As we get a better understanding about the BIM technology and especially Revit, your project will be benefits from it.

The Future of BIM

As continuing the discussion from the class, similar to the post from our group. I believe the BIM will have a bright future, but it could take more than 10 years for the technology to be practical in other engineering fields.

The major concern for me about the BIM and specifically the Revit to be more practical is the community. As for my own experience and research, most of the firms are still using AutoCAD as their priority tool to deliver their projects. Moreover, governments as the biggest clients in all countries, will pay a huge role here as we speak of the future of the Revit. For instance, my coop experience at City of Philadelphia uses CAD in all our projects and I do not see the changes will come sooner than later. The education of the Revit is still developing and not to mention the elder architects and engineers are more unfamiliar to Revit than recent graduates.

Contractor is also the obstruct for the practice of Revit to be practical, contractors are relatively less educated than the engineers and architects. However, they also need their key personals to be familiar with Revit. In fact, in the lecture of Revit by Autodesk university, there are only a few people works for the contractors. The amount of cost of money and time is huge, and the desire of Revit is relatively low.

Nevertheless, in the meantime, Revit is still advancing. The changes during a decade will be outrageous. Also, with the education on the BIM and relevant subjects, the future of the BIM technology and the use of the Revit is bright. Revit will be more intimate in construction industry with the development of the other technology like AI and robotics. As we speak of, some of the projects are already uses the robotics in construction or even uses the 3D printer for small units to the whole structure. These innovations will lead the development of the modeling tools like Revit and other BIM technologies.

In conclusion, I believe the future practical of the Revit will be significant in our field, but I think it going to take more than a decade for the changes to happening.

Jacklynn Lord: I agree with your post a lot. Your experience in AECOM is good to know. I believe the training of Revit is beneficial to all of us. The innovation is happening, no matter if it comes sooner or later. The problem between versions could be worth noticing when different parties are involving in a project. However, I do not think it will be hard to solve it in the future.

Hanyan Chen: I agree with you the sharing data repository is a key feature for Revit. The families can be sharing in Revit will help a lot regarding to connect the whole industry. The data repository will help the fields to better innovating. I believe it will help in delivering more intelligent and environmentally friendly designs.

Ren: I agree with you about the economic efficiency is a factor for BIM to be practical. The community lack of experience of BIM is also my concern. Some of these people even do not concern the new technology as opportunity to them but in the contrary, they regard it as the threats. I believe the BIM’s development leads and relies on the industry to development at the same time.

BIM Handbook Chapter 6 - BIM for Contractors

 Building Information System (BIM) has been a big part of the modern construction industry. Not only the owner and the architects/engineers benefit from the technology, contractors also enjoy the many benefits brought by from the BIM technology. For a contractor point of view, timely manner and money are two critical elements in their business. BIM technology has potential to help the contractors to deliver the project perfectly with a maximize benefits. Although constructors are not design firms who needs to develop the BIM model from the beginning, there are a ton of contractors that are currently develop beam to support coordination, clash detection, estimating, 4D CAD, procurement, and so forth (Eastman, 2011).

One thing I noticed interesting here is although the design teams whether or not developed the models during the design stages, the contractors are creating their own building models from scratch to support coordination. In my point of view, this is extreme inefficiency as the contactor has to develop models during their construction stage. I believe as the BIM becomes more and more essential for the future construction industry, the use of BIM needs to be more standardized. The work distribution between different parties needs to be clear. In that way the whole construction phases will be more efficient and can save more time as well as money for all parties.

One of the prospects the constructor benefits from using the BIM technology is the construction analysis and planning. Traditional bar charts were used to plan projects but it unable to show the link between different activities in a sequence. Also, most people cannot determine if the schedule is feasible or not. BIM technology provides a better solution to the problem. The first method is by using 4D CAD. 4D CAD is 3D models with also time associations, which means the construction schedule is also linked to the model. Another approach is use analysis tools that incorporate BIM components.

Overall, although the constructors do not develop the design directly, there are also multiple benefits towards the contractors assisting them to save money and time.

1.      Eastman, Charles M. BIM Handbook: A Guide to Building Information Modeling for Owners, Managers, Designers, Engineers and Contractors. Vol 2nd ed. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley; 2011. http://ezproxy2.library.drexel.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=364239&site=ehost-live.

Comments:

Yidi Li: You listed several benefits for contractors to use the BIM in the future work. They are certainly beneficial for the contractors as long-term development. One thing I noticed in your post is the current scheduling system is in needs for improvements, I think the 4D model as one of the approaches will be really beneficial for the contractors in their future development.

Qiaodan Lin: I learned several points from your post about BIM for owners and facility manager. One thing I think is worth mentioning is the cooperation between architectural design to MEP development. The details can be then including in one model rater than in 2D they are in different plans. That will minimize the conflicts and is easier for contractors to work with.

Michal Tse: Your personal experience is really interesting. The conflicts between contractors and architects/engineers are always there. BIM indeed is a great way to cooperate between different parties. Not only between the stakeholders but also between contractors and sub-contractors; and between different sub-contractors.

Wenhan Fu Week 2 Blog: Database, Network, Sociology, Future

Wenhan Fu

Week 2 Blog: Database, Network, Sociology, Future

Database has already been used for decades in a ton of different industries. It provides the users with more efficiency to access, backup and analysis the different data sets. As the internet industry growing exponentially, the database industry also has tremendous changes. The increasingly enormous amounts of data flooding websites and businesses and the different database system brings chaos [1]. Therefore, many companies may find out there once organized data nowadays are promiscuous. In the future, the one database that can provide a single system that does everything from full-text search to in-memory storage, graph analysis, and more will be the solution to the companies to reorganize its data [1].

Another close topic will be the network, network consists of two or more computers that are linked in order to share resources and exchange files. It has been changed a lot within the past decades, it has become wireless, faster, safer and etc. In the future, it will continue to develop mostly in these aspects: The demise of the WLAN controller, ethernet switches become transparent, everything else in the cloud [2]. Moreover, the speed of the network has been improved a lot in the last 10 years, nowadays 4G network has been covered for 99% of the United States territory, the next generation which is the 5G network has already been standardized and will be used commercially with in the next few years.

Sociology contains a lot of topics. With the development of the modern technology, the study of the sociology also looked over in these prospective. One of the is the threats of the robotics. With the robotics ability to learn, many scientists are concerned that developments in human technology may soon pose new, extinction-level risks to our species as a whole [3]. It is truly a dialectical topic and will be discuss a lot I the future.

1.      Finley, K. “World’s Many Databases Unite to Form One Simple Super-services” Wired.com, Feb. 2014, https://www.wired.com/2014/02/orchestrate/

2.      Mathias, C. “What is the future of networking for enterprises?” SearchingNetworking. Com, N.A, https://searchnetworking.techtarget.com/opinion/What-is-the-future-of-networking-for-enterprises

3.      N.A. “Foundation to Study the threats from robotics and other future technologies.” N.A. http://cser.org/index.html

Comments on Robert Borrelli's post:

I see you focused a lot on architectural field and that is what I have not been focused on. Your post provided me with some details about the database important pieces of information and other insights. But maybe a little more discussion about the future development will be even better for your post.

Comments on Alkiviadis Tsitsios's post:

Your post is really interesting and you noticed a lot of insights of these three topics. One thing interesting that caught up my mind is the 5G network. As you stated, it is really a fast pace the network development and I am really curious where will this fast growing industry leads us to.

Introduction - Wenhan Fu

My name is Wenhan(Daniel) Fu, senior student in civil engineering concentrated in construction management. I am an international student from Chengdu, China. My city is also the hometown for our national treasure: Panda. I came to the states in 2012 to pursue my bachelor degree.

My last co-op was at City of Philadelphia. I was in capital project team of department of public property. Our team is responsible for the managing of all public facilities during both design and construction stage. My daily responsibilities include develop a series of design for the renovation of a fire station and other projects’ design developments.

My understanding of intelligent building is “building automatic” type of building. The building’s heating, ventilation, lighting and other systems through building management system (BAS) will be automatic centralized controlled.

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