Design-Project Databases (DPDB) in CAD Software and Their Potential Role in Reshaping the Organization of Architectural Praxis

Abstract

Construction society is an environment that involves multi-disciplinary design efforts. The various subsystems of construction society organize their decisions and actions for the accomplishment of their common plan, the design and construction of a building artifact. This paper argues that the quality of the final building artifact is affected by the organizational patterns that its begetters inherit. The Design-Project Database (DPDB) is a theoretical computational framework which facilitates intelligent mechanisms that raise the potential for the various participants in an architectural design project to surpass habitual modes of organizational operation that undermine the quality of the design process and of its final product. However, the thesis of this paper is that technology will not solely accomplish this turn. Rather, it is suggested that a cultural change is needed as a complement to a technological framework. As a substitute to the habitual modes of organizational operation, this paper suggests a meshwork-based collaborative approach to the organization of architectural praxis. To this end, the paper first attempts to unveil and explain the habitual organizational behaviors that take place in an architectural design praxis context. The paper then examines computational environments that support collaborative organizational patterns focusing on CAD data management mechanisms or simply databases. Next, the paper analyzes the design information handling mechanisms that a Design-Project Database (DPDB) facilitates namely constraint-based design, non-graphical data generation, multi-discipline access, and integration of discipline-specific software. Last, the paper focuses on the assumptions that guide a meshwork-based collaborative approach to the organization of architectural practice.