RobiNZ CAD Blog

The Physics of the "I" in BIM

What is a Building Information Model? My interpretation is simply an  information model of a building. It’s not a technology, it’s not a way of working, it’s the expression of a building as data. To the architect it’s a design and, hopefully, construction model, to the engineer it’s an analysis & fabrication model, to the owner it may include the economic model used to justify it’s creation and the operating model that will determine and manage it’s life-cycle.

Whatever your definition there’s a common factor in all these models. Whether digital or analog, they are all forms of information.

But what is information? The rather surprising answer is, “everything”, even you! Quirks & Quarks have a  podcast (posted in Jan 08) of a forum discussion which takes the meaning of “Information” about as far as it’s possible to go. Its not really about Building Information Modelling but it does make you think. We are all information models, creating information models!

The Physics of Information: What the Universe Doesn't Want You to Know | CBC Radio | Quirks & Quarks

Physicists are not like you and me. That’s because they don't see the world the same way we do.
Take information, for instance. When you have a question or an interest in some topic, and you want more information about it, chances are you look for answers by reading a book, searching the Internet, or even listening to a radio program. But that's not how physicists view information. They want to know what it's actually made of. And that idea leads to a whole lot of weird and quirky views of how the universe works...

Microsoft Research WorldWide Telescope, breathtaking!

This is what made Robert Scoble cry and Buzz Bruggeman, CEO of ActiveWords, called "the best thing he’s seen in years from Microsoft" a couple of weeks ago.

Science educator Roy Gould and Microsoft's Curtis Wong introduce the Worldwide Telescope at TED:

From:  The Worldwide Telescope - www.worldwidetelescope.org/

"The WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is a rich visualization environment that functions as a virtual telescope, bringing together imagery from the best ground and space telescopes in the world for a seamless, guided exploration of the universe"

3D, isn't always as it seems...

Sadly magician, illusionist, thinker Jerry Andrus died recently. He was a master of illusions which use perspective to fool the mind. About 1 minute into this one look for a city model that defies gravity. You can view the others on his website.

via Bad Astronomy Blog

IBM & Nanotech

IBM are manipulating atoms aiming to get a thousand times current storage densities. Imagine your server, on your iPod…

IBM Nanotech Breakthroughs Point To Tech's Future Building Blocks: Scientific American
New research explores using atoms and molecules to pack more data storage and computing capabilities into smaller spaces.

Total Lunar Eclipse - Wow!

This has nothing to do with CAD but thought you might enjoy. The total Lunar Eclipse tonight was an amazing sight. These photos aren’t the greatest resolution but capture the colours. My little Canon iXus on a tripod needed 15 second + exposures to get anything during the darkest part. I missed having a DSLR tonight….

Just as it started. Not sure if the halo was part of the eclipse or from cloud that cleared at just the right time.

Going, with just a wisp of cloud.

Going, lovely purple & hint of red…

Gone! There was so little light at this stage nothing showed on the camera screen at all. The moon looked red, but not quite as red as the camera sensor captured it.

Tags: Lunar+Eclipse, Auckland, New+Zealand

30 Years of the Metric System

I’m a bit late with this but every time I try imperial based CAD templates or look at database tables that must handle Imperial I’m so glad that about 30 years ago this happened.

30 Years of the Metric System | NZ Ministry of Consumer Affairs

14 December 2006 – Thirty years ago today the metric system was introduced into New Zealand says Consumer Affairs Minister Judith Tizard. The Weights and Measures Amendment Act became law on the 14 December 1976…

You still encounter “Imperial measures” on legacy plans, old survey drawings usually, but it’s getting to be less common. Now we just need to adopt 24:00 time format to get rid of the am/pm stupidity.

It’s amusing that, nearly alone, America persist with “A collection of English units”

From Wikipedia: Countries without the Metric system are Liberia, Myanmar, and USA.

Tags: Metric+system

To Boldly Go... Burt Rutan

Burt Rutan’s inspiring talk at TED.

(Recorded February 2006 in Monterey, CA. Duration: 20:16)

More TEDTalks: TEDTalks website

Tags: Burt+Rutan, TED+Talks

Teleportation Between Light and Matter?

A remarkable story in Scientific American about what could be a crucial step towards a revolution in computer technology: Quantum Computing.

First Teleportation Between Light and Matter | Science & Technology at Scientific American.com
At long last researchers have teleported the information stored in a beam of light into a cloud of atoms, which is about as close to getting beamed up by Scotty as we're likely to come in the foreseeable future.

I won’t pretend to understand it all but that’s OK;

If you are not completely confused by quantum mechanics, you do not understand it.
John Wheeler.

It is safe to say that nobody understands quantum mechanics.
Richard Feynman.

Quotes via Physics Musings

Inventor designs F1 in Schools!

This is cool, school students design a CO₂ powered Formula One cars and race for a trip to the finals at the Australian Grand Prix, Melbourne, Australia. I’ve been to this GP twice and it’s a fantastic event. The circuit is a short tram ride from Melbourne's CBD and the GP literally takes over the city for the week. A great challenge, but what a reward!

F1 in Schools! - www.f1inschools.us
The Formula 1 (F1) in Schools initiative creates a fun and motivating environment for students to experience the engineering process. The worldwide popularity of F1 racing lends excitement while providing a relevant background for simulating critical elements of engineering in the real world.

The winning teams from each country are invited to compete in the World Championships to be held in Melbourne, Australia, at the Australian Grand Prix in March 2007.

Autodesk, Denford, and Pitsco have teamed with TSA to introduce students to industry-standard software and equipment that help them relate academic and technical subjects and put them into a real-life working environment, with the hope to help them make informed career choices. The teams work with 3-D CAD/CAM software and computational fluid dynamics (CFD) software as they strive to build the fastest F1 car of the future. They design everything from the car body to the wheels and axles, and they assemble the components after generating drawings of the race cars. The cars are raced on an 80-foot track and are powered by CO2 cartridges. The cars reach speeds of close to 50 mph.

Via In the Machine - Inventor Blog

Digital Paper takes flight

Recently I blogged about digital design of Aircraft using the title “The end of paper flight?”.

The odd thing is that many flights, especially in light aircraft, are totally dependent on paper – thick books of charts and flight instructions. It seems rather primitive to have pilots carrying hundreds of bits of paper, searching for the right chart when they probably have more important tasks to do!

It appears that hassle is about to end as electronic ink, digital paper, takes to the air. eFlyBook is a small, electronic notebook for use in the cockpit which uses a passive, paper like, digital ink display and stylus, pen like, entry for searching.

Seems like the only paper in flight will be aircraft like the Barnaby Flyer...*

eFlyBook by ARINC
For the first time, digital FAA flight charts, en route charts, terminal procedures, and other flight documents can be downloaded, stored and viewed easily on eFlyBook, a small, electronic notebook for use in the cockpit. Charts, documents, and other digital content are provided by MyAirplane.com, which uses its award-winning viewer and compression technology to minimize storage requirements without degrading the quality of the documents.

via www.whatisnew.com 

* The Barnaby Flyer is a proper paper aircraft, NOT a dart. With a bit of care when folding it can achieve proper controlled flight, even circle and use updrafts to gain height. It was invented by Capt. Ralph S. Barnaby, USN (Ret), and it first appeared in his book "How to Make & Fly Paper Airplanes" (Scholastic Book Services 1968).

I was about 10 when I read his book as part of a science project on flight. I made many, probably hundreds, and watched one fly for an amazing, stopwatch timed, 3 minutes after launching from a high cliff near Piha. It flew several hundred metres down almost to sea level then climbed, in an updraft, almost returning to the launch point before descending again to the sea – Biodegradable of course!

Celestia shows space is big and beautiful

In 1983 John Walker drew The Solar System to scale in AutoCAD-86. It was a demonstration of AutoCAD’s floating point database resolution and I remember being shown it when I was at Tech. Everyone was amazed at the precision as they zoomed from Pluto’s orbit down to a plaque on the leg of the Lunar Lander, Eagle, with readable text.

That was a long time ago but I remembered it tonight as experienced similar amazement when I watched Celestia in action. It’s a free real-time 3D space simulation, for Windows/Mac/Unix, which lets you travel through our solar system and to over 100,000 stars in our neighbourhood.

Once installed (approx 11mb download) I recommend you start off with the Demo Tour launched from the Help Menu. The screen-shot (Earth with New Zealand orbited to centre stage) gives an idea of the display quality you’ll see but prepare to be amazed as you zoom from the Earth to the Moon, then the Sun, Saturn & its Moons. Its then back to Earth for a short tour of the Northern and Southern hemisphere night sky with stars and constellations on display. Next a very quick trip across the universe to the giant red star Antares, a brief look at the Milky Way from a distance, then home to earth again.

Now its your turn to explore the 3d photo real accurate celestial model as you wish. Its simple to use, but information rich and stunning to look at, with comprehensive options that will keep your amused for hours. Thanks to the authors: Chris Laurel, Clint Weisbrod,,Fridger Schrempp, Bob Ippolito, Christophe Teyssier, Hank Ramsey, Grant Hutchiso and many others who contributed to this excellent software.

Link: Celestia Home page
(If the main page is off line there will still be a link to the download site and forum).

*Note: Shaan Hurley has the AutoCAD file mentioned, solar-1.dwg, available for download in AutoCAD 2004 format and more information on AutoCAD 64 bit precision on his AutoCAD Blog – Between the Lines.