Based on prior research on information workspaces at Stanford the work presented in this paper describes an approach to enhance the interoperability between standard AEC applications. Beyond the ability to visualize multi-disciplinary relationships within a project model, our approach allows the automated propagation of changes to the model. This is accomplished by integrating the applications in a middleware controlled messaging infrastructure which is based on an extensible and flexible data model. Compared to today’s standardized product models the proposed model enables users to relate data of discipline-specific applications much more flexibly and easily. These criteria are particularly valuable for rapid computational generation and analysis of virtual project models since the content for a model can differ from meeting to meeting depending on its participants and scope. Especially during meetings, the proposed software environment could therefore allow project participants to evaluate several project alternatives during the same iRoom meeting, enabling them to predict the effects of each variation on e.g. costs, schedule and the necessary resources. We presume that such a decision process based on the simulation and evaluation of different project alternatives as virtual models will enable meeting participants to communicate and analyze critical relationships among project information faster. Furthermore, we expect that the efficiency and comprehensiveness of the decision making process in meetings will increase. We believe that such a solution would decrease the risk inherent to complex decisions and motivate project teams to spend more time to find high quality solutions to their problems in less time.
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