Methods for Computable Building Codes

Abstract

Currently, the complexity of building regulatory and standards increases rapidly with the acquisition of new knowledge in the design and construction domain. The need for computable representation of the building codes and regulations for automating the code checking process is becoming ever more important. Within the framework of Building Information Modeling (BIM) workflow, model checking against building codes and standards is generally needed to be an automatic or semi-automatic process. These checking mechanisms generally do not modify a building design, but rather evaluates a design on the basis of the configuration of objects, their relations and attributes. This paper presents an overview of the main existing methods for computerizing building codes and regulations. It reviews main concepts for these methods including knowledge representation, reasoning procedures, and knowledge acquisition. Additionally, this research explores the capabilities of the cited approaches in terms of strengths and practical limitations for creating computable building regulatory. Keywords: