Basic Structure of a Building Model for Representing and Using Knowledge of Buildings in CAAD Systems

Abstract

This paper presents a basic structure of a building model for representing and using knowledge of buildings concerning the geometry in the field of architectural design based on the object-oriented concept. We construct a building model using knowledge of location relationships between building components and we are concerned with the type of buildings which have the concepts of reference lines and stories with horizontal floors.

The salient features and effectiveness of the proposed model are as follows. Classes of objects are classified by generalization abstraction. A conceptual building model is constructed by the aggregation abstraction using classes of building components and relationships between them. The location of each component is defined by a disposition object which includes general rules used to specify relative location relationships between building components in the practice of architectural design. The connection relationships between building components are automatically derived from attributes of instances for defining the location of components. A room is represented by objects for surfaces different from building components. Knowledge of the way of representing a building component in an application model can be included in methods of the component. Because of the effect of such methods: (i) the data structure of the proposed model is simple and precise and the processing of room-related data is easy; (ii) the modification of the model is automatically carried out according to the general rules of location relationships between building components; (iii) the representations in an application model can be automatically generated and changed; and (iv) the proposed model has high extensibility and stability.