Typological Knowledge Acquisition through a Schema of Generic Representations

Architectural design is highly knowledge intensive with a diversity of classes of knowledge necessary for design expertise. Despite the centrality of knowledge in design, acquisition procedures for the extraction and formalisation of design knowledge are scarce. The paper presents a schema of generic representations that are proposed as a framework for the modeling of generic design of building types. The general graphical schema of generic design can function as a knowledge extraction and representation tool. It enables the identification of knowledge required for design decisions and provides a framework for representing and instantiating this knowledge in a sequential graphical form. The schema has been implemented for typological knowledge (building types in architectural design). The general schema has also been exploited in order to develop a design-support system for the generic design of a specific building type. The paper presents the theoretical rationale and background for the development of the general schema and demonstrates its utility.

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