Category: AEC

Aug 15 2008

Chewing the CAD

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Business/Financial, Functionality, Future, Marketing, People issues, SaaS, Vendors
15 August 2008

Cadalyst Manufacturing has a thought-provoking viewpoint article written by J. Paul Grayson, CEO of Alibre, that suggests “the CAD software market is stuck in time, somewhere in the late 1970s or early 1980s, when mainframes and minicomputers were the primary platform of professional computing”. Despite the advances in personal computing in other fields, including the …

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/08/chewing-the-cad/

Aug 14 2008

BIM for Building Engineers

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Collaboration, Functionality, Future, People issues
14 August 2008

The latest Cadalyst AEC Insight column, Modeling Technology for Building Engineers, by Jerry Laiserin talks about the particular challenges of coordinating designs produced by architects with the needs of engineers involved in designing mechanical, electrical and plumbing (MEP) services. It reiterates a message conveyed several times over the past year or so: there are different …

AEC, AECbytes, architects, BIM, Building Engineers, building information modelling, Cadalyst, collaboration, electrical and plumbing, interoperability, Jerry Laiserin, mechanical, MEP, Sid Thoo, sustainability

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/08/bim-for-building-engineers/

Aug 04 2008

Think no more

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Blogs, Collaboration, Future, Internet, Marketing, People issues, Sustainability
4 August 2008

Zerochampion blogger Phil Clark is today (Think RIP) coming to terms with publisher CMP’s decision to discontinue its sustainability conference/exhibition event, Think – the latest manifestation of which, Think 08, I attended earlier this year. As the event organiser, he lists various reasons behind the decision: Crowded market/branding Names – “we were too late to …

AEC, Be2camp, blog, branding, CMP, communication, conference, events, Field of Dreams, ICT, marketing, Phil Clark, sustainability, Sustainability Now, Think 08, Web 2.0, wisdom of crowds, ZeroChampion

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/08/think-no-more/

Aug 04 2008

BIW grows 24% in 2007

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Business/Financial, Collaboration, Internet, SaaS, Vendors
4 August 2008

BIW Technologies [my employer] grew its turnover by 24 per cent in the year to 30 September 2007, achieving over £0.5m in profits in the process (see full news release here). The company’s turnover in 2007 grew to £5.76m, up from £4.66m the previous year. A modest 2006 loss of £171,000 was turned around in …

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/08/biw-grows-24-in-2007/

Aug 01 2008

BE2Camp, 10 October, London

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Blogs, Collaboration, Future, Internet, Marketing, People issues, Sustainability
1 August 2008

Web 2.0 meets the UK construction industry at a novel new event, BE2camp, to be held on Friday 10 October at the Building Centre in London. I have been part of the (international) planning team behind this event, so I am delighted that we now have some details confirmed. If you fancy becoming part of …

Be2camp, Building Centre, Construction, London, Web 2.0

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/08/be2camp-10-october-london/

Jul 30 2008

Paper cuts

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Collaboration, Extranet/CDE, Functionality, Internet, People issues, Sustainability
30 July 2008

I spent a couple of hours this morning with a postgraduate student researching ‘project extranets’ as part of his dissertation. Among the topics we discussed was the extent to which construction collaboration technologies reduce the volume of paper used on a project. Working for BIW, I have seen great variations in the use of paper …

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/07/paper-cuts/

Jul 25 2008

History of CAD touches on extranets

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Business/Financial, Extranet/CDE, Future, Internet, Marketing, SaaS, Vendors
25 July 2008

David Weisberg has published online a comprehensive history of CAD, which is available free at http://www.cadhistory.net. I had a quick skim through a couple of chapters to see what, if anything, he’d written about construction collaboration technologies – and he hasn’t ignored them. Chapter 6 (Autodesk and AutoCAD, PDF), for example, has a page or …

AutoCAD, Autodesk, Bentley Systems, Bidcom, BluelineOnline, Bricsnet, Buildpoint, Buzzsaw, CAD, cadhistory.net, collaboration, Construction, Cubus, David Weisberg, extranets, ProjectWise, Viecon
1 comment

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/07/history-of-cad-touches-on-extranets/

Jul 25 2008

Another good BIM viewpoint

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Business/Financial, Collaboration, Functionality, Future, Internet, Legal, People issues, SaaS
25 July 2008

The latest AECbytes viewpoint is from Stuart Carroll of US IT provider Beck Technology. In BIM: When Will It Enter “The Ours” Zone?, he responds to an earlier article on Building Information Modelling (BIM) by John Tobin (Proto-Building: To BIM is to Build), and echoes my own, often-repeated view (see post, for example) that it’s …

3D, AECbytes, Beck Technology, BIM, BIMstorm, BIW, building information modelling, BuildLondonLive, charrettes, collaboration, design coordination, John Tobin, people, processes, Stuart Carroll, technology, USA

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/07/another-good-bim-viewpoint/

Jul 25 2008

Construction Computing Awards 2008

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Marketing
25 July 2008

Nominations for this year’s Construction Computing Awards are now open. Nominate your favourite company or product at www.constructioncomputingawards.co.uk. Nominations close on 10 September. No parallel exhibition this year (see The Great Construction Computing no-show).

awards, Construction Computing, exhibitions

Permanent link to this article: http://extranetevolution.com/2008/07/construction-computing-awards-2008-2/

Jul 25 2008

Construction Matters (but ICT doesn’t)

By Paul Wilkinson in AEC, Extranet/CDE, Future, Internet, People issues, Sustainability
25 July 2008

Courtesy of the latest Constructing Excellence members newsletter, I got a link to the latest report, Construction Matters (Vol I, PDF), from the House of Commons Business and Enterprise Committee. I wanted to see if this report was any better than the recent Strategy for Sustainable Construction (see post) in regards to recommending better use …