Cumincad : CUMINCAD Papers : Search Results

CumInCAD is a Cumulative Index about publications in Computer Aided Architectural Design
supported by the sibling associations ACADIA, CAADRIA, eCAADe, SIGraDi, ASCAAD and CAAD futures

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_id	96cf
authors	Woolley, B.
year	1992
title	Virtual Worlds: A Journey in Hype and Hyperreality
source	Oxford: Blackwell
summary	In Virtual Worlds, Benjamin Woolley examines the reality of virtual reality. He looks at the dramatic intellectual and cultural upheavals that gave birth to it, the hype that surrounds it, the people who have promoted it, and the dramatic implications of its development. Virtual reality is not simply a technology, it is a way of thinking created and promoted by a group of technologists and thinkers that sees itself as creating our future. Virtual Worlds reveals the politics and culture of these virtual realists, and examines whether they are creating reality, or losing their grasp of it.
series	other
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	acadia06_455
id	acadia06_455
authors	Ambach, Barbara
year	2006
title	Eve’s Four Faces interactive surface configurations
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.acadia.2006.455
source	Synthetic Landscapes [Proceedings of the 25th Annual Conference of the Association for Computer-Aided Design in Architecture] pp. 455-460
summary	Eve’s Four Faces consists of a series of digitally animated and interactive surfaces. Their content and structure are derived from a collection of sources outside the conventional boundaries of architectural research, namely psychology and the broader spectrum of arts and culture.The investigation stems from a psychological study documenting the attributes and social relationships of four distinct personality prototypes: the Individuated, the Traditional, the Conflicted, and the Assured (York and John 1992). For the purposes of this investigation, all four prototypes are assumed to be inherent, to certain degrees, in each individual. However, the propensity towards one of the prototypes forms the basis for each individual’s “personality structure.” The attributes, social implications and prospects for habitation have been translated into animations and surfaces operating within A House for Eve’s Four Faces. The presentation illustrates the potential for constructed surfaces to be configured and transformed interactively, responding to the needs and qualities associated with each prototype. The intention is to study the effects of each configuration and how each configuration may be therapeutic in supporting, challenging or altering one’s personality as it oscillates and shifts through the four prototypical conditions.
series	ACADIA
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:54

_id	2006_040
id	2006_040
authors	Ambach, Barbara
year	2006
title	Eve’s Four Faces-Interactive surface configurations
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.2006.040
source	Communicating Space(s) [24th eCAADe Conference Proceedings / ISBN 0-9541183-5-9] Volos (Greece) 6-9 September 2006, pp. 40-44
summary	Eve’s Four Faces consists of a series of digitally animated and interactive surfaces. Their content and structure are derived from a collection of sources outside the conventional boundaries of architectural research, namely psychology and the broader spectrum of arts and culture. The investigation stems from a psychological study documenting the attributes and social relationships of four distinct personality prototypes; the “Individuated”, the “Traditional”, the “Conflicted” and the “Assured”. (York and John, 1992) For the purposes of this investigation, all four prototypes are assumed to be inherent, to certain degrees, in each individual; however, the propensity towards one of the prototypes forms the basis for each individual’s “personality structure”. The attributes, social implications and prospects for habitation have been translated into animations and surfaces operating within A House for Eve’s Four Faces. The presentation illustrates the potential for constructed surfaces to be configured and transformed interactively, responding to the needs and qualities associated with each prototype. The intention is to study the effects of each configuration and how it may be therapeutic in supporting, challenging or altering one’s personality as it oscillates and shifts through the four prototypical conditions.
keywords	interaction; digital; environments; psychology; prototypes
series	eCAADe
type	normal paper
last changed	2022/06/07 07:54

_id	735a
authors	Anh, Tran Hoai
year	1992
title	FULL-SCALE EXPERIMENT ON KITCHEN FUNCTION IN HANOI
source	Proceedings of the 4rd European Full-Scale Modelling Conference / Lausanne (Switzerland) 9-12 September 1992, Part A, pp. 19-30
summary	This study is a part of a licentiate thesis on "Functional kitchen for the Vietnamese cooking way"at the Department of Architecture and Development studies, Lund University. The issues it is dealing with are: (1) Inadequacy of kitchen design in the apartment buildings in Hanoi, where the kitchen is often designed as a mere cooking place - other parts of the food making process are not given any attention. (2) Lack of standard dimensional and planning criteria for functional kitchen which can serve as bases for kitchen design. // The thesis aims at finding out indicators on functional spatial requirements for kitchen, which can serve as guide-line for designing functional kitchen for Hanoi. One of the main propositions in the thesis is that functional kitchens for Hanoi should be organised to permit the culinary activities done according to the Vietnamese urban culinary practice. This is based on the concept that the culinary activity is an expression Of culture, thus the practice of preparing meal in the present context of the urban households in Hanoi has an established pattern, method which demand a suitable area and arrangement in the kitchen. This pattern and cooking method should make up the functional requirement for kitchen in Hanoi, and be taken in to account if functional kitchen designing is to be achieved. In the context of the space-limited apartment building of Hanoi, special focus is given to find out indicators on the minimum functional spatial requirements of the kitchen works.
keywords	Full-scale Modeling, Model Simulation, Real Environments
series	other
type	normal paper
more	http://info.tuwien.ac.at/efa
last changed	2004/05/04 15:29

_id	10b7
authors	Aukstakalnis, Steve and Blatner, David
year	1992
title	Silicon Mirage: The Art and Science of Virtual Reality
source	Peachpit Press
summary	An introduction to virtual reality covers every aspect of the revolutionary new technology and its many possible applications, from computer games to air traffic control. Original. National ad/promo.
series	other
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	ecaadesigradi2019_449
id	ecaadesigradi2019_449
authors	Becerra Santacruz, Axel
year	2019
title	The Architecture of ScarCity Game - The craft and the digital as an alternative design process
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.2019.3.045
source	Sousa, JP, Xavier, JP and Castro Henriques, G (eds.), Architecture in the Age of the 4th Industrial Revolution - Proceedings of the 37th eCAADe and 23rd SIGraDi Conference - Volume 3, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal, 11-13 September 2019, pp. 45-52
summary	The Architecture of ScarCity Game is a board game used as a pedagogical tool that challenges architecture students by involving them in a series of experimental design sessions to understand the design process of scarcity and the actual relation between the craft and the digital. This means "pragmatic delivery processes and material constraints, where the exchange between the artisan of handmade, representing local skills and technology of the digitally conceived is explored" (Huang 2013). The game focuses on understanding the different variables of the crafted design process of traditional communities under conditions of scarcity (Michel and Bevan 1992). This requires first analyzing the spatial environmental model of interaction, available human and natural resources, and the dynamic relationship of these variables in a digital era. In the first stage (Pre-Agency), the game set the concept of the craft by limiting students design exploration from a minimum possible perspective developing locally available resources and techniques. The key elements of the design process of traditional knowledge communities have to be identified (Preez 1984). In other words, this stage is driven by limited resources + chance + contingency. In the second stage (Post-Agency) students taking the architects´ role within this communities, have to speculate and explore the interface between the craft (local knowledge and low technological tools), and the digital represented by computation data, new technologies available and construction. This means the introduction of strategy + opportunity + chance as part of the design process. In this sense, the game has a life beyond its mechanics. This other life challenges the participants to exploit the possibilities of breaking the actual boundaries of design. The result is a tool to challenge conventional methods of teaching and leaning controlling a prescribed design process. It confronts the rules that professionals in this field take for granted. The game simulates a 'fake' reality by exploring in different ways with surveyed information. As a result, participants do not have anything 'real' to lose. Instead, they have all the freedom to innovate and be creative.
keywords	Global south, scarcity, low tech, digital-craft, design process and innovation by challenge.
series	eCAADeSIGraDi
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:54

_id	2cb4
authors	Bille, Pia
year	1992
title	CAD at the AAA
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.1992.279
source	CAAD Instruction: The New Teaching of an Architect? [eCAADe Conference Proceedings] Barcelona (Spain) 12-14 November 1992, pp. 279-288
summary	Teaching computer science at the Aarhus School of Architecture goes back as far as to the beginning of the 80’s, when a few teachers and students were curious towards the new media seeing its great developing perspectives and its possible use in the design of architecture. The curiosity and excitement about technology continued, although the results were modest and the usefulness not a dominant aspect in this early period. In the middle of the 80’s the School of Architecture was given the opportunity by means of state funding to buy the first 10 IBM PC's to run AutoCad among other programmes. Beside this a bigger CAD-system Gable 4D Series was introduced running on MicroVax Workstations. The software was dedicated to drafting buildings in 2 and 3 dimensions - an important task within the profession of architects.
series	eCAADe
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:52

_id	cef3
authors	Bridges, Alan H.
year	1992
title	Computing and Problem Based Learning at Delft University of Technology Faculty of Architecture
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.1992.289
source	CAAD Instruction: The New Teaching of an Architect? [eCAADe Conference Proceedings] Barcelona (Spain) 12-14 November 1992, pp. 289-294
summary	Delft University of Technology, founded in 1842, is the oldest and largest technical university in the Netherlands. It provides education for more than 13,000 students in fifteen main subject areas. The Faculty of Architecture, Housing, Urban Design and Planning is one of the largest faculties of the DUT with some 2000 students and over 500 staff members. The course of study takes four academic years: a first year (Propaedeuse) and a further three years (Doctoraal) leading to the "ingenieur" qualification. The basic course material is delivered in the first two years and is taken by all students. The third and fourth years consist of a smaller number of compulsory subjects in each of the department's specialist areas together with a wide range of option choices. The five main subject areas the students may choose from for their specialisation are Architecture, Building and Project Management, Building Technology, Urban Design and Planning, and Housing. The curriculum of the Faculty has been radically revised over the last two years and is now based on the concept of "Problem-Based Learning". The subject matter taught is divided thematically into specific issues that are taught in six week blocks. The vehicles for these blocks are specially selected and adapted case studies prepared by teams of staff members. These provide a focus for integrating specialist subjects around a studio based design theme. In the case of second year this studio is largely computer-based: many drawings are produced by computer and several specially written computer applications are used in association with the specialist inputs. This paper describes the "block structure" used in second year, giving examples of the special computer programs used, but also raises a number of broader educational issues. Introduction of the block system arose as a method of curriculum integration in response to difficulties emerging from the independent functioning of strong discipline areas in the traditional work groups. The need for a greater level of selfdirected learning was recognised as opposed to the "passive information model" of student learning in which the students are seen as empty vessels to be filled with knowledge - which they are then usually unable to apply in design related contexts in the studio. Furthermore, the value of electives had been questioned: whilst enabling some diversity of choice, they may also be seen as diverting attention and resources from the real problems of teaching architecture.
series	eCAADe
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:54

_id	89d9
authors	Cajati, Claudio
year	1992
title	The New Teaching of an Architect: The Rôle of Expert Systems in Technological Culture
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.1992.435
source	CAAD Instruction: The New Teaching of an Architect? [eCAADe Conference Proceedings] Barcelona (Spain) 12-14 November 1992, pp. 435-442
summary	We already have the EEC, that is the European Economic Community. We have to build the CCE, that is the Common Cultural Europe. Architects and building engineers of any european country will be allowed to freely practise in any other country of the EEC. Of course, it is not only matter of coming down of the frontiers, of a greater labour mobility. Not even it will be enough that the university degree courses of the different countries agree to and put into effect the EEC common directives. They need rules and guidelines entering into the merits of practice: rules and guidelines which, rather than a legal and bureaucratic matter, must be the result of a common cultural and technical work, about clear and delimited questions of shared subjects, in which all the community countries be deeply concerned. Analogously, in the very field of research, the project "Human Capital and Mobility" has in view a greater european scientific and technological competitiveness, through an integration of human and material resources of different research centres, such as in shared-cost research projects and in concerted research actions. Such an integration is neither easy nor rapid. The political, social, cultural, technological peculiarities of the countries of the European Community certainly constitute an obstacle for the creation of a supernational cultural and technological pool. of common opportunities. These peculiarities, however, aren't only a restraint for the european community effort of unification and construction of shared goals, constraints, rules, methods, techniques, tools. They mean also a richness, an unrepeatable resourse: they are the result of a historical millenary stratification, which gave rise to urban and architectural contexts, to cultural and technological traditions it would be a serious mistake to waste.
series	eCAADe
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:54

_id	0ac0
authors	Coyne, Richard and Newton, Sidney
year	1992
title	Metaphors, Computers and Architectural Education
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.1992.307
source	CAAD Instruction: The New Teaching of an Architect? [eCAADe Conference Proceedings] Barcelona (Spain) 12-14 November 1992, pp. 307-318
summary	In this paper we present the case for employing metaphor to explain the impact of technology. This contrasts with the empirical-theoretical method of inquiry. We also contrast two widely held metaphors of architectural education (the EPISTEMOLOGICAL and the COMMUNITY metaphors) and of the role of the computer (the MAINFRAME and the UBIQUITOUS COMPUTING metaphors). We show how in each case both metaphors result in different kinds of decision making in relation to resourcing an architecture school.
series	eCAADe
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:56

_id	6bff
authors	Coyne, Richard
year	1992
title	The Role of Metaphor in Understanding Computers in Design
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.acadia.1992.003
source	Mission - Method - Madness [ACADIA Conference Proceedings / ISBN 1-880250-01-2] 1992, pp. 3-11
summary	The study of metaphor provides valuable insights into the workings of thought and understanding. This chapter addresses the important question of what the study of metaphor has to say about technology, the design process and hence the role of computers in design. The conclusion is that design involves the generation of action within a collaborative environment in which there is the free play of metaphor. A recognition of the close relationship between technology and metaphor provides insights into how to evaluate and develop the effective use of computers in design.
series	ACADIA
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:56

_id	sigradi2017_068
id	sigradi2017_068
authors	da Motta Gaspar, João Alberto; Regina Coeli Ruschel
year	2017
title	A evolução do significado atribuído ao acrônimo BIM: Uma perspectiva no tempo [The evolution of the meaning ascribed to the acronym BIM: A perspective in time]
source	SIGraDi 2017 [Proceedings of the 21th Conference of the Iberoamerican Society of Digital Graphics - ISBN: 978-956-227-439-5] Chile, Concepción 22 - 24 November 2017, pp.461-469
summary	The term Building Information Model emerged in 1992. It has evolved over time and has its meaning currently associated with an object-oriented modeling technology and an associated set of processes to produce, communicate and analyze building models. Its origin is related to several other, older terms. This paper registers the evolution of BIM and related definitions over time by means of a systematic literature review. We present a list of BIM-related terms and their meanings, organized by date of emergence, and charts showing which ones are most used over time, contributing to better understanding of the meaning of BIM.
keywords	BIM; History of BIM; Building Information Model.
series	SIGRADI
email
last changed	2021/03/28 19:58

_id	9f8a
authors	Davidow, William H.
year	1992
title	The Virtual Corporation: Structuring and Revitalizing the Corporation for the 21St Century
source	New York: Harper Collins Publishers
summary	The great value of this timely, important book is that it provides an integrated picture of the customer-driven company of the future. We have begun to learn about lean production technology, stripped-down management, worker empowerment, flexible customized manufacturing, and other modern strategies, but Davidow and Malone show for the first time how these ideas are fitting together to create a new kind of corporation and a worldwide business revolution. Their research is fascinating. The authors provide illuminating case studies of American, Japanese, and European companies that have discovered the keys to improved competitiveness, redesigned their businesses and their business relationships, and made extraordinary gains. They also write bluntly and critically about a number of American corporations that are losing market share by clinging to outmoded thinking. Business success in the global marketplace of the future is going to depend upon corporations producing "virtual" products high in added value, rich in variety, and available instantly in response to customer needs. At the heart of this revolution will be fast new information technologies; increased emphasis on quality; accelerated product development; changing management practices, including new alignments between management and labor; and new linkages between company, supplier, and consumer, and between industry and government. The Virtual Corporation is an important cutting-edge book that offers a creative synthesis of the most influential ideas in modern business theory. It has already fired excitement and debate in industry, academia, and government, and it is essential reading for anyone involved in the leadership of America's business and the shaping of America's economic future.
series	other
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	cf73
authors	Dosti, P., Martens, B. and Voigt, A.
year	1992
title	Spatial Simulation In Architecture, City Development and Regional Planning
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.1992.195
source	CAAD Instruction: The New Teaching of an Architect? [eCAADe Conference Proceedings] Barcelona (Spain) 12-14 November 1992, pp. 195-200
summary	The appropriate use of spatial simulation techniques considerably tends to increase the depth of evidence and the realistic content of the design and plannings to be described and moreover may encourage experimentations, trial attempts and planning variants. This means also the more frequent use of combinations between different techniques, having in mind that they are not equivalent, but making use of the respective advantages each offers. Until now the main attention of the EDP-Lab was directed on achieving quantity. For the time to come time it will be the formation of quality. The challenge in the educational system at the Vienna University of Technology is to obtain appropriate results in the frame- work of low-cost simulation. This aspect seems also to be meaningful in order to enforce the final implementation in architectural practice.
series	eCAADe
email
more	http://info.tuwien.ac.at/ecaade/
last changed	2022/06/07 07:55

_id	6ea4
authors	Eastman, C.M.
year	1992
title	A Data Model Analysis of Modularity and Extensibility in Building Databases
source	Building and Environment, Vol 27, No: 2, pp. 135-148
summary	This paper uses data modeling techniques to define how database schemas for an intelligent integrated architectural CAD system can be made extensible. It reviews the product data modeling language EDM, then applies it to define a part of an architectural data model. Extensions are then investigated, regarding how users could integrate various design-specific packages into a uniquely configured system. Both, extension by substituting one technology for another and by adding a new evaluation application, are considered. Data modeling allows specification of a CAD database and identification of the kind of modularization that will work and what problems may arise.''
series	journal paper
email
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	7ce5
authors	Gal, Shahaf
year	1992
title	Computers and Design Activities: Their Mediating Role in Engineering Education
source	Sociomedia, ed. Edward Barret. MIT Press
summary	Sociomedia: With all the new words used to describe electronic communication (multimedia, hypertext, cyberspace, etc.), do we need another one? Edward Barrett thinks we do; hence, he coins the term "sociomedia." It is meant to displace a computing economy in which technicity is hypostasized over sociality. Sociomedia, a compilation of twenty-five articles on the theory, design and practice of educational multimedia and hypermedia, attempts to re-value the communicational face of computing. Value, of course, is "ultimately a social construct." As such, it has everything to do with knowledge, power, education and technology. The projects discussed in this book represent the leading edge of electronic knowledge production in academia (not to mention major funding) and are determining the future of educational media. For these reasons, Sociomedia warrants close inspection. Barrett's introduction sets the tone. For him, designing computer media involves hardwiring a mechanism for the social construction of knowledge (1). He links computing to a process of social and communicative interactivity for constructing and desseminating knowledge. Through a mechanistic mapping of the university as hypercontext (a huge network that includes classrooms as well as services and offices), Barrett models intellectual work in such a way as to avoid "limiting definitions of human nature or human development." Education, then, can remain "where it should be--in the human domain (public and private) of sharing ideas and information through the medium of language." By leaving education in a virtual realm (where we can continue to disagree about its meaning and execution), it remains viral, mutating and contaminating in an intellectually healthy way. He concludes that his mechanistic model, by means of its reductionist approach, preserves value (7). This "value" is the social construction of knowledge. While I support the social orientation of Barrett's argument, discussions of value are related to power. I am not referring to the traditional teacher-student power structure that is supposedly dismantled through cooperative and constructivist learning strategies. The power to be reckoned with in the educational arena is foundational, that which (pre)determines value and the circulation of knowledge. "Since each of you reading this paragraph has a different perspective on the meaning of 'education' or 'learning,' and on the processes involved in 'getting an education,' think of the hybris in trying to capture education in a programmable function, in a displayable object, in a 'teaching machine'" (7). Actually, we must think about that hybris because it is, precisely, what informs teaching machines. Moreover, the basic epistemological premises that give rise to such productions are too often assumed. In the case of instructional design, the episteme of cognitive sciences are often taken for granted. It is ironic that many of the "postmodernists" who support electronic hypertextuality seem to have missed Jacques Derrida's and Michel Foucault's "deconstructions" of the epistemology underpinning cognitive sciences (if not of epistemology itself). Perhaps it is the glitz of the technology that blinds some users (qua developers) to the belief systems operating beneath the surface. Barrett is not guilty of reactionary thinking or politics; he is, in fact, quite in line with much American deconstructive and postmodern thinking. The problem arises in that he leaves open the definitions of "education," "learning" and "getting an education." One cannot engage in the production of new knowledge without orienting its design, production and dissemination, and without negotiating with others' orientations, especially where largescale funding is involved. Notions of human nature and development are structural, even infrastructural, whatever the medium of the teaching machine. Although he addresses some dynamics of power, money and politics when he talks about the recession and its effects on the conference, they are readily visible dynamics of power (3-4). Where does the critical factor of value determination, of power, of who gets what and why, get mapped onto a mechanistic model of learning institutions? Perhaps a mapping of contributors' institutions, of the funding sources for the projects showcased and for participation in the conference, and of the disciplines receiving funding for these sorts of projects would help visualize the configurations of power operative in the rising field of educational multimedia. Questions of power and money notwithstanding, Barrett's introduction sets the social and textual thematics for the collection of essays. His stress on interactivity, on communal knowledge production, on the society of texts, and on media producers and users is carried foward through the other essays, two of which I will discuss. Section I of the book, "Perspectives...," highlights the foundations, uses and possible consequences of multimedia and hypertextuality. The second essay in this section, "Is There a Class in This Text?," plays on the robust exchange surrounding Stanley Fish's book, Is There a Text in This Class?, which presents an attack on authority in reading. The author, John Slatin, has introduced electronic hypertextuality and interaction into his courses. His article maps the transformations in "the content and nature of work, and the workplace itself"-- which, in this case, is not industry but an English poetry class (25). Slatin discovered an increase of productive and cooperative learning in his electronically- mediated classroom. For him, creating knowledge in the electronic classroom involves interaction between students, instructors and course materials through the medium of interactive written discourse. These interactions lead to a new and persistent understanding of the course materials and of the participants' relation to the materials and to one another. The work of the course is to build relationships that, in my view, constitute not only the meaning of individual poems, but poetry itself. The class carries out its work in the continual and usually interactive production of text (31). While I applaud his strategies which dismantle traditional hierarchical structures in academia, the evidence does not convince me that the students know enough to ask important questions or to form a self-directing, learning community. Stanley Fish has not relinquished professing, though he, too, espouses the indeterminancy of the sign. By the fourth week of his course, Slatin's input is, by his own reckoning, reduced to 4% (39). In the transcript of the "controversial" Week 6 exchange on Gertrude Stein--the most disliked poet they were discussing at the time (40)--we see the blind leading the blind. One student parodies Stein for three lines and sums up his input with "I like it." Another, finds Stein's poetry "almost completey [sic] lacking in emotion or any artistic merit" (emphasis added). On what grounds has this student become an arbiter of "artistic merit"? Another student, after admitting being "lost" during the Wallace Steven discussion, talks of having more "respect for Stevens' work than Stein's" and adds that Stein's poetry lacks "conceptual significance[, s]omething which people of varied opinion can intelligently discuss without feeling like total dimwits...." This student has progressed from admitted incomprehension of Stevens' work to imposing her (groundless) respect for his work over Stein's. Then, she exposes her real dislike for Stein's poetry: that she (the student) missed the "conceptual significance" and hence cannot, being a person "of varied opinion," intelligently discuss it "without feeling like [a] total dimwit." Slatin's comment is frightening: "...by this point in the semester students have come to feel increasingly free to challenge the instructor" (41). The students that I have cited are neither thinking critically nor are their preconceptions challenged by student-governed interaction. Thanks to the class format, one student feels self-righteous in her ignorance, and empowered to censure. I believe strongly in student empowerment in the classroom, but only once students have accrued enough knowledge to make informed judgments. Admittedly, Slatin's essay presents only partial data (there are six hundred pages of course transcripts!); still, I wonder how much valuable knowledge and metaknowledge was gained by the students. I also question the extent to which authority and professorial dictature were addressed in this course format. The power structures that make it possible for a college to require such a course, and the choice of texts and pedagogy, were not "on the table." The traditional professorial position may have been displaced, but what took its place?--the authority of consensus with its unidentifiable strong arm, and the faceless reign of software design? Despite Slatin's claim that the students learned about the learning process, there is no evidence (in the article) that the students considered where their attitudes came from, how consensus operates in the construction of knowledge, how power is established and what relationship they have to bureaucratic insitutions. How do we, as teaching professionals, negotiate a balance between an enlightened despotism in education and student-created knowledge? Slatin, and other authors in this book, bring this fundamental question to the fore. There is no definitive answer because the factors involved are ultimately social, and hence, always shifting and reconfiguring. Slatin ends his article with the caveat that computerization can bring about greater estrangement between students, faculty and administration through greater regimentation and control. Of course, it can also "distribute authority and power more widely" (50). Power or authority without a specific face, however, is not necessarily good or just. Shahaf Gal's "Computers and Design Activities: Their Mediating Role in Engineering Education" is found in the second half of the volume, and does not allow for a theory/praxis dichotomy. Gal recounts a brief history of engineering education up to the introduction of Growltiger (GT), a computer-assisted learning aid for design. He demonstrates GT's potential to impact the learning of engineering design by tracking its use by four students in a bridge-building contest. What his text demonstrates clearly is that computers are "inscribing and imaging devices" that add another viewpoint to an on-going dialogue between student, teacher, earlier coursework, and other teaching/learning tools. The less proficient students made a serious error by relying too heavily on the technology, or treating it as a "blueprint provider." They "interacted with GT in a way that trusted the data to represent reality. They did not see their interaction with GT as a negotiation between two knowledge systems" (495). Students who were more thoroughly informed in engineering discourses knew to use the technology as one voice among others--they knew enough not simply to accept the input of the computer as authoritative. The less-advanced students learned a valuable lesson from the competition itself: the fact that their designs were not able to hold up under pressure (literally) brought the fact of their insufficient knowledge crashing down on them (and their bridges). They also had, post factum, several other designs to study, especially the winning one. Although competition and comparison are not good pedagogical strategies for everyone (in this case the competitors had volunteered), at some point what we think we know has to be challenged within the society of discourses to which it belongs. Students need critique in order to learn to push their learning into auto-critique. This is what is lacking in Slatin's discussion and in the writings of other avatars of constructivist, collaborative and computer-mediated pedagogies. Obviously there are differences between instrumental types of knowledge acquisition and discoursive knowledge accumulation. Indeed, I do not promote the teaching of reading, thinking and writing as "skills" per se (then again, Gal's teaching of design is quite discursive, if not dialogic). Nevertheless, the "soft" sciences might benefit from "bridge-building" competitions or the re-institution of some forms of agonia. Not everything agonistic is inhuman agony--the joy of confronting or creating a sound argument supported by defensible evidence, for example. Students need to know that soundbites are not sound arguments despite predictions that electronic writing will be aphoristic rather than periodic. Just because writing and learning can be conceived of hypertextually does not mean that rigor goes the way of the dinosaur. Rigor and hypertextuality are not mutually incompatible. Nor is rigorous thinking and hard intellectual work unpleasurable, although American anti-intellectualism, especially in the mass media, would make it so. At a time when the spurious dogmatics of a Rush Limbaugh and Holocaust revisionist historians circulate "aphoristically" in cyberspace, and at a time when knowledge is becoming increasingly textualized, the role of critical thinking in education will ultimately determine the value(s) of socially constructed knowledge. This volume affords the reader an opportunity to reconsider knowledge, power, and new communications technologies with respect to social dynamics and power relationships.
series	other
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	32eb
authors	Henry, Daniel
year	1992
title	Spatial Perception in Virtual Environments : Evaluating an Architectural Application
source	University of Washington
summary	Over the last several years, professionals from many different fields have come to the Human Interface Technology Laboratory (H.I.T.L) to discover and learn about virtual environments. In general, they are impressed by their experiences and express the tremendous potential the tool has in their respective fields. But the potentials are always projected far in the future, and the tool remains just a concept. This is justifiable because the quality of the visual experience is so much less than what people are used to seeing; high definition television, breathtaking special cinematographic effects and photorealistic computer renderings. Instead, the models in virtual environments are very simple looking; they are made of small spaces, filled with simple or abstract looking objects of little color distinctions as seen through displays of noticeably low resolution and at an update rate which leaves much to be desired. Clearly, for most applications, the requirements of precision have not been met yet with virtual interfaces as they exist today. However, there are a few domains where the relatively low level of the technology could be perfectly appropriate. In general, these are applications which require that the information be presented in symbolic or representational form. Having studied architecture, I knew that there are moments during the early part of the design process when conceptual decisions are made which require precisely the simple and representative nature available in existing virtual environments. This was a marvelous discovery for me because I had found a viable use for virtual environments which could be immediately beneficial to architecture, my shared area of interest. It would be further beneficial to architecture in that the virtual interface equipment I would be evaluating at the H.I.T.L. happens to be relatively less expensive and more practical than other configurations such as the "Walkthrough" at the University of North Carolina. The set-up at the H.I.T.L. could be easily introduced into architectural firms because it takes up very little physical room (150 square feet) and it does not require expensive and space taking hardware devices (such as the treadmill device for simulating walking). Now that the potential for using virtual environments in this architectural application is clear, it becomes important to verify that this tool succeeds in accurately representing space as intended. The purpose of this study is to verify that the perception of spaces is the same, in both simulated and real environment. It is hoped that the findings of this study will guide and accelerate the process by which the technology makes its way into the field of architecture.
keywords	Space Perception; Space (Architecture); Computer Simulation
series	thesis:MSc
last changed	2003/02/12 22:37

_id	130d
authors	Hoinkes, R. and Mitchell, R.
year	1994
title	Playing with Time - Continuous Temporal Mapping Strategies for Interactive Environments
source	6th Canadian GIS Conference, (Ottawa Natura Resources Canada), pp. 318-329
summary	The growing acceptance of GIS technology has had far- reaching effects on many fields of research. The recent developments in the area of dynamic and temporal GIS open new possibilities within the realm of historical research where temporal relationship analysis is as important as spatial relationship analysis. While topological structures have had wide use in spatial GIS and have been the subject of most temporal GIS endeavours, the different demands of many of these temporally- oriented analytic processes questions the choice of the topological direction. In the fall of 1992 the Montreal Research Group (MRG) of the Canadian Centre for Architecture mounted an exhibition dealing with the development of the built environment in 18th- century Montreal. To aid in presenting the interpretive messages of their data, the MRG worked with the Centre for Landscape Research (CLR) to incorporate the interactive capabilities of the CLR's PolyTRIM research software with the MRG's data base to produce a research tool as well as a public- access interactive display. The interactive capabilities stemming from a real- time object- oriented structure provided an excellent environment for both researchers and the public to investigate the nature of temporal changes in such aspects as landuse, ethnicity, and fortifications of the 18th century city. This paper describes the need for interactive real- time GIS in such temporal analysis projects and the underlying need for object- oriented vs. topologically structured data access strategies to support them.
series	other
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	4b2a
id	4b2a
authors	Jabi, Wassim
year	2004
title	A FRAMEWORK FOR COMPUTER-SUPPORTED COLLABORATION IN ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN
source	University of Michigan
summary	The development of appropriate research frameworks and guidelines for the construction of software aids in the area of architectural design can lead to a better understanding of designing and computer support for designing (Gero and Maher 1997). The field of research and development in computer-supported collaborative architectural design reflects that of the early period in the development of the field of computersupported cooperative work (CSCW). In the early 1990s, the field of CSCW relied on unsystematic attempts to generate software that increases the productivity of people working together (Robinson 1992). Furthermore, a shift is taking place by which researchers in the field of architecture are increasingly becoming consumers of rather than innovators of technology (Gero and Maher . In particular, the field of architecture is rapidly becoming dependent on commercial software implementations that are slow to respond to new research or to user demands. Additionally, these commercial systems force a particular view of the domain they serve and as such might hinder rather than help its development. The aim of this dissertation is to provide information to architects and others to help them build their own tools or, at a minimum, be critical of commercial solutions.
series	thesis:PhD
type	normal paper
email
last changed	2004/10/24 22:35

_id	caadria2004_k-1
id	caadria2004_k-1
authors	Kalay, Yehuda E.
year	2004
title	CONTEXTUALIZATION AND EMBODIMENT IN CYBERSPACE
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.caadria.2004.005
source	CAADRIA 2004 [Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Computer Aided Architectural Design Research in Asia / ISBN 89-7141-648-3] Seoul Korea 28-30 April 2004, pp. 5-14
summary	The introduction of VRML (Virtual Reality Markup Language) in 1994, and other similar web-enabled dynamic modeling software (such as SGI’s Open Inventor and WebSpace), have created a rush to develop on-line 3D virtual environments, with purposes ranging from art, to entertainment, to shopping, to culture and education. Some developers took their cues from the science fiction literature of Gibson (1984), Stephenson (1992), and others. Many were web-extensions to single-player video games. But most were created as a direct extension to our new-found ability to digitally model 3D spaces and to endow them with interactive control and pseudo-inhabitation. Surprisingly, this technologically-driven stampede paid little attention to the core principles of place-making and presence, derived from architecture and cognitive science, respectively: two principles that could and should inform the essence of the virtual place experience and help steer its development. Why are the principles of place-making and presence important for the development of virtual environments? Why not simply be content with our ability to create realistically-looking 3D worlds that we can visit remotely? What could we possibly learn about making these worlds better, had we understood the essence of place and presence? To answer these questions we cannot look at place-making (both physical and virtual) from a 3D space-making point of view alone, because places are not an end unto themselves. Rather, places must be considered a locus of contextualization and embodiment that ground human activities and give them meaning. In doing so, places acquire a meaning of their own, which facilitates, improves, and enriches many aspects of our lives. They provide us with a means to interpret the activities of others and to direct our own actions. Such meaning is comprised of the social and cultural conceptions and behaviors imprinted on the environment by the presence and activities of its inhabitants, who in turn, ‘read’ by them through their own corporeal embodiment of the same environment. This transactional relationship between the physical aspects of an environment, its social/cultural context, and our own embodiment of it, combine to create what is known as a sense of place: the psychological, physical, social, and cultural framework that helps us interpret the world around us, and directs our own behavior in it. In turn, it is our own (as well as others’) presence in that environment that gives it meaning, and shapes its social/cultural character. By understanding the essence of place-ness in general, and in cyberspace in particular, we can create virtual places that can better support Internet-based activities, and make them equal to, in some cases even better than their physical counterparts. One of the activities that stands to benefit most from understanding the concept of cyber-places is learning—an interpersonal activity that requires the co-presence of others (a teacher and/or fellow learners), who can point out the difference between what matters and what does not, and produce an emotional involvement that helps students learn. Thus, while many administrators and educators rush to develop webbased remote learning sites, to leverage the economic advantages of one-tomany learning modalities, these sites deprive learners of the contextualization and embodiment inherent in brick-and-mortar learning institutions, and which are needed to support the activity of learning. Can these qualities be achieved in virtual learning environments? If so, how? These are some of the questions this talk will try to answer by presenting a virtual place-making methodology and its experimental implementation, intended to create a sense of place through contextualization and embodiment in virtual learning environments.
series	CAADRIA
type	normal paper
last changed	2022/06/07 07:52

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