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Bernstein and Bentley both emphasized the importance of CAD not as an end in itself but as a medium for supporting information exchange throughout the life cycle of buildings.

Bernstein, formerly the director of information technology for architect Cesar Pelli, described the evolution of Autodesk's technologies from automating drafting to supporting three-dimensional design thinking. Indeed, he noted, 4D design is now showing promise.

Referring to the ability of animations and embedded schedule-related data to help analyze and visualize projects over time, Bernstein has applied 4D tools in a number of ways. Portions of the high-rise Goldman-Sachs building in Jersey City, for example, were under construction while other portions were still being designed.

In a demonstration of 4D simulation, he showed an animated visualization of the emergency exiting behavior of people in a building being designed. By identifying bottlenecks in corridors and exit doors, the Simulex evacuation modeler, from Integrated Environmental Solutions, shows designers clearly where the weaknesses of their circulation design lie.

Greg Bentley emphasized the importance of integrated tools that capture design information for use during building maintenance and operations. He noted that what the construction industry spends on information creation is small compared to the expense of construction, which in turn is dwarfed by the cost of maintaining the building into the future.

CAD data, therefore, must be usable during construction and fabrication processes, as well as for facilities management. Bentley cited the new MicroStation V8, which now works with AutoCAD data formats, and Viecon, which promises to turn construction documents into searchable databases.

Also, during this plenary session, Kristine K. Fallon, FAIA, president of the Chicago firm Kristine Fallon Associates, Inc., was presented with the 2001 Ed Forrest Award for Excellence in Design/Construction Automation. This annual award recognizes industry leaders for their contributions to the intelligent use of automation in the AEC professions.

Since the 1970s, Fallon has been a pioneer in applying information technology to architecture, engineering, and facility management. As the first woman to win this award, she further celebrated her success at the SYSTEMS Show's first annual forum on women in the AEC industry.

At the forum moderated by Jill Rothenberg, a principal of the Cambridge, Massachusetts firm ADD Inc, women, who are under-represented in the AEC professions, shared their experiences of coping with attitudes of their male peers. Future forums will offer practical advice and mentoring to young women.

The Education Continues

The conference portion of the A/E/C Systems 2001 included dozens of seminars and panel discussions. Themed "Where Technology Means Business," the conference targeted the nine broad topics of the Internet, architecture, civil design, construction, facilities management, A/E firm management, IT management, GIS/mapping, and professional development.

These sessions, taught by both industry consultants and in-the-trenches design professionals, provided an opportunity for attendees to catch up on the latest technologies and ideas about how to implement them in their own firms.

For example, architect John Jurewicz, of the design/build firm McClier, shared what he has learned about project extranets and the differences between the leading systems. Key to adoption, he emphasized, is understanding one's own workflow and how the various systems can support it.

"A Day in the Life" was a series of presentations by design professionals describing their experience using collaboration systems in real projects. For example, Mike Hnastchenko, of the Minneapolis, Minnesota office of A/E giant Ellerbe Becket used Buzzsaw to collaborate with an international design and construction team in the creation of an OptiGlobe data center in Brazil.

Despite differences in language and technological sophistication, the team succeeded in improving their productivity. For example, links from the Buzzsaw centralized drawing database to reprographers worldwide reduced the time and cost needed to ship paper drawings.

Moreover, this experience showed that even a gradual move to digital technology can prove useful. Builders accustomed to faxing requests for information (RFIs) were encouraged to scan such documents and send them electronically as PDF files. Shortening the turnaround time for RFIs offered significant cost savings by speeding the construction schedule.

In a particularly interactive session on project extranets, chaired by industry consultant Joel Orr, cofounder of Cyon Research, software vendors and audience explained their views of the obstacles to adoption.

From the vendor point of view, the hurdles include the need for users to change traditional work methods, the failure of the Web to provide the necessary interoperability, and the number of hardware and operating system platforms they must write code for.

In an impassioned plea from the floor, the needs of users were articulated as — quite simply — reliability. When a project extranet fails, even if only briefly, users become easily discouraged. Those design professionals who have championed the technology in their firms are in danger of losing credibility and user participation in future experiments.

At the Product Show

Despite the evident contraction that many vendors appear to be experiencing, the show was not without its contingent of new product announcements. Some of those, from CAD industry leaders Autodesk, Graphisoft, Bentley, and Revit, were previewed in ArchitectureWeek.

Receiving much of the buzz among attendees were two Windows-only 3D "sketch" modelers intended to extend computer-aided design functions into schematic design.

The surface modeler SketchUp by @Last Software and the solid modeler within Architectural Studio, forthcoming from Autodesk, are both aimed at designers who traditionally have shied away from the precision tools more suitable for the construction documents phase.

When demonstrated on pressure sensitive tablets, these systems appear to answer the universal request from users for true ease of use. But despite their popularity at the show this year, they owe an unacknowledged debt to the pioneering 3D sketch modeling applications ModelShop, Alias Upfront, and DesignWorkshop.

Other products also received attention and applause. The editors of CADALYST magazine announced their pick for the nine "Best of Show" products. These were Autodesk Building Services, AutoVue SolidModel Professional, BLIS Project, Oce TDS Series, RenderDrive RD500, Scan2CAD Pro, TRIRIGA, X2-Tech, and Collaborative Engineering Solutions.

Editors of DigitalCAD.com and AECNewsroom.com announced their own list of Best Awards for products with unique features and perceived overall impact on the AEC industry. Winners included the Prolog Pocket Handhelds, SketchUp, Architecture for MicroStation TriForma, Revit 3.1, TeamBuilder, Intelligent Business System, and eReview.

Towards Interoperability

For several years, SYSTEMS Show attendees have been hearing about the industry push toward the interoperability of disparate systems. This very difficult goal has been slow to achieve, but each year brings incremental progress.

Most notable this year was the work of the Building Lifecycle Interoperable Software (BLIS) project. A group of software companies and public agencies have coordinated to demonstrate data sharing through the Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) standards established by the International Alliance for Interoperability (IAI).

These organizations include Timberline (cost estimating), Graphisoft (CAD), Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (energy), Solibri, Inc. (design checking), and some 50 others. Through a certification process, their respective software is shown to accurately share relevant portions of a common data model of a building project.

BLIS was instituted to overcome the wait-and-see attitude that most software vendors appeared to be adopting towards the IFC's. BLIS model "views" of building data will be implemented, using XML, to communicate geometry and discipline-specific subsets of object types required by each application area.

The A/E/C SYSTEMS Show is produced by Penton Media, Inc. Next year's event, scheduled for June 3-6, 2002 in Anaheim, California, will expand its focus beyond the planning, design, and construction phases of the asset lifecycle to include owning, managing, and modifying.

B.J. Novitski is managing editor of ArchitectureWeek.

Petronas Towers, by Cesar Pelli, in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, 1998. Before joining Autodesk, Philip Bernstein, FAIA directed information technology for this firm. Photo: Anton Bocaling Designers can test the adequacy of a building's exits through the Simulex evacuation modeler. Image: Integrated Environmental Solutions According to Greg Bentley, only fraction of total costs in the construction industry go to information creation, so digital tools should be made to better support building operations. Image: Bentley Systems Incorporated Kristine K. Fallon, FAIA, president of the Chicago firm Kristine Fallon Associates, Inc., received the 2001 Ed Forrest Award for Excellence in Design/Construction Automation from W. Bradley Holtz, president of Cyon Research. Photo: A/E/C SYSTEMS A house model in the new 3D sketch modeling software, SketchUp. Image: @Last Software The house model rendered in Piranesi, 3D paint software from Informatix Software International. Image: @Last Software Cost and value engineering (COVE) software from BLIS partner Solibri, Inc. demonstrates decision analysis and support within a 3D model. Image: Solibri, Inc.   Click on thumbnail images to view full-size pictures.