Chaudhari-A Team- Week 3- Future Problems with Revit/BIM

Joseph Chaudhari (A Team)

Week 3 Blog

“What are the possible future problems with Revit/BIM?”

Future problems are potentially many when it comes to software such as Revit or other BIM. As we discussed in week three’s lecture, one major issue that Revit could be posed with as it evolves regards its ability to process large files. As we could only imagine, construction projects will only get bigger, more complex, and more (clean) energy oriented as time progresses. Larger projects will result in more paperwork and project drawings, be they HVAC, geotechnical, or structural (or any of the many more types of drawings), which will require a more advanced version of Revit and a computer with more processing power to entertain the idea of even running a version of Revit that could sustain files of such size. What if Revit cannot handle these big files? What if computer processing power cannot support the advanced versions of Revit that will be needed to enable usage and creation of these large files? If either of these questions have an answer that is negative in manner, then we will be in a great deal of trouble as we will have computers “freezing” or Revit taking quite some time to open and import files. Slow programs, be they Revit or any other BIM, will result in low employee morale and thus a poor workplace environment. I have seen and experienced employees acting in such a way due to technological hindrance and it is not pretty.

The speaker we had this week, week 3, in class mentioned how big of a hassle it is for Revit to update. Dr. Mitchell then elaborated on this saying how it may be very likely that older Revit files, say for a project that took place in 2015, might not be openable on a version of Revit in 2036. This will come into play if a building ever needs maintenance or any services that will require old, original, drawings to be viewed. What will engineers do if they cannot view the original plans that were made for the building. This type of problem can be seen in programs like Microsoft word (where an older file cannot be opened).

Another problem with future Revit lies in the philosophy of “giving a man a fish will feed him for a day, but teaching him how to fish will feed him forever”. What I mean by this is if Revit becomes too user friendly or too simply such that, maybe with the aid of artificial intelligence, an engineer is no longer needed and any user could just punch a few keys or run a few commands and create a completed building ready for construction, we could see ourselves in a world of turmoil. Why would this be bad? Would it not be a good thing if engineers were no longer needed heavily in the design process and a computer with AI could just “do the whole thing”? No, this would be bad in the long run because we could run into situations where computers designing the building are destroyed or the theory I talked about earlier comes true and Revit crashes on a project. Engineers or whoever would be controlling these computers would not know how to read project drawings or determine what goes where on a construction site if the design process became this easy due to an extremely advanced version of Revit or BIM. It would, in a sense, possibly make engineers “weaker” assets to companies as they might not care to know the extra details regarding a building’s drawings if Revit could just take care of everything.

Job loss. Job loss is always an issue as industries and their technologies evolve. Better BIM systems would mean less time being spent on design contracts for projects. Less time spent on individual projects mean more, theoretically, could be accomplished with less. The less I am referring to would be employees. Advancement of BIM could lead to one brand of BIM dominating the other entirely; thus, entire companies could fail, go bankrupt, or be bought by the larger and dominating company [1]. This could result in potential job loss.

Ultimately, I think the benefits future versions or Revit and BIM will bring to the table (as along as Moore’s Law hold relatively true) will greatly outweigh their shortcomings.

References

1.      The Urban Developer. "10 Predictions for the Future of Building Information Modelling (BIM)."TheUrbanDeveloper.com. N.p., 07 July 2016. Web. 26 Jan. 2017.

Responses

Peter Dannemann: Using drones to collect data for geotechnical or surveying data and then importing that data to Revit would be amazing. I have spent a lot of my time in the field surveying and it can get tiresome and it can sometimes be impossible if there is a physical barrier between the surveyor and the Trimble Total Station. I have also spent a lot of time flying drones over the past three years and I think it would be so much easier using a drone (maybe with infrared sensors on it?) to pick up information, help in the surveying process, and convey that information directly to Revit.

URL: https://ae-410-510-ay16-17.blogspot.com/2017/01/b3-group-c-peter-dannemann.html

Maria Raggousis: Revit and other types of BIM technology behaving slowly or freezing is terrible. It can cause employee frustration and lower the effectiveness of an entire office. Even worse, slow or malfunctioning equipment can cause loss of projects, missed deadlines, and loss of money. Thank you for providing the story in your post about how your firm fixed the issues of crashing computer programs. Having multiple version of the same software is a good back-up plan for the worst-case scenarios.

URL: https://ae-410-510-ay16-17.blogspot.com/2017/01/assignment-b3-group-b-maria-raggousis.html

Drew Hovey: I completely agree with you and am glad you up the fact that Revit will indeed be extremely helpful in the future, as it is now, as it evolves. Revit will have its problems, such as freezing or lacking to carry over files from one version of the program to another, but ultimately these small hindrances will be negligible compared to the advantages brought about future versions of Revit (at least I hope so).

URL: https://ae-410-510-ay16-17.blogspot.com/2017/01/drew-hovey-blog-post-3.html