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	ddss9202
id	ddss9202
authors	Koutamanis, A. and Mitossi, V.
year	1993
title	Architectural computer vision: Automated recognition of architectural drawings
source	Timmermans, Harry (Ed.), Design and Decision Support Systems in Architecture (Proceedings of a conference held in Mierlo, the Netherlands in July 1992), ISBN 0-7923-2444-7
summary	Computer vision offers the ability to transform digitized drawings into documents that can be used with computer systems. Recognition of digitized drawings can occur at the levels of (a) geometric elements, (b) building elements, and (c) spatial articulation. The last two levels apply not only to digitized images but also to computer-produced ones. The enormous burden placed on the user for inputting and manipulating CAD drawings suggests that automated recognition can add to the capabilities of CAD by making the computer more flexible with respect to inputting design information and more responsive to the actual concerns of the designer.
series	DDSS
last changed	2003/08/07 16:36

_id	cd30
authors	Koutamanis, Alexander
year	1993
title	On the Correlation of Design and Computational Techniques in Architectural Education
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.1993.x.g6i
source	[eCAADe Conference Proceedings] Eindhoven (The Netherlands) 11-13 November 1993
summary	Many studies employ analyses of human intelligence as justification or guideline for the development of machine intelligence. The main benefit brought on by such studies has been the improvement of our understanding of both human and machine intelligence. In teaching architecture with computers the same approach can make explicit design techniques architects use by means of equivalent or similar computational techniques. Explicitation of design techniques leads to a better understanding of architects' activities, as well as to which computer tools can offer automated support to these activities. In the curriculum of the Faculty of Architecture, Delft University of Technology, relations and correspondences between computational and design techniques form a major underlying theme in computer-aided design courses. The purposes of this theme are (i) comprehension of the computational structure of a computer design tool, and (ii) explanation of how such computational structures relate to architectural design. (correspondences between the computational principles of computer programs and design techniques are instrumental in defining the scope of each computer tool in architectural design while improving the students' understanding of architectural design as a cognitive process and thus promoting automation as a natural extension of established conventional practices. The paper outlines the correlation of computational and design techniques in the case of electronic spreadsheets. Spreadsheets are introduced through a thorough presentation of the various kinds and aspects of constraint propagation, their underlying computational principle. Numerical constraint propagation is explained by means of spreadsheet applications for simple numerical calculations. Symbolic constraint propagation is presented in the framework of machine perception. Both forms are then linked to architectural design through parametric design and the recognition of spaces in floor plans. Exercises linked to spreadsheets and constraint propagation include the parametric calculation of stairs and making parametric variations of a building on the basis of floor area calculations.
series	eCAADe
email
more	http://caad.bk.tudelft.nl/koutamanis/
last changed	2022/06/07 07:50

_id	2b3d
authors	Oltman, P.K. and Bejar, I.L. and Kim, S.H.
year	1993
title	An Approach to Automated Scoring of Architectural Designs
source	CAAD Futures ‘93 [Conference Proceedings / ISBN 0-444-89922-7] (Pittsburgh / USA), 1993, pp. 215-224
summary	An automated approach to scoring architectural designs of building sites was devised. Design drawings were represented in the computer as a database consisting of a series of objects and their locations and relationships to other objects. Designs were automatically scored by: (a) determining whether or not certain basic requirements were met (such as parking, handicapped access, and building within site boundaries) and (b) determining the extent to which the drawings met criteria of efficient site design. The drawings had been scored earlier by a panel of expert registered architects. The automated technique was able to reproduce the human jurors' ratings for many drawings. In particular, drawings that the automated technique failed were quite likely to have been failed by human jurors as well.
keywords	Design Evaluation, Site Design
series	CAAD Futures
last changed	1999/04/07 12:03

_id	8db9
authors	Liu, Yu-Tung
year	1993
title	A Connectionist Approach to Shape Recognition and Transformation
source	CAAD Futures ‘93 [Conference Proceedings / ISBN 0-444-89922-7] (Pittsburgh / USA), 1993, pp. 19-36
summary	In human design processes, many drawings of shapes remain incomplete or are executed inaccurately. Cognitively, a designer is able to discern these anomalous shapes, whereas current CAAD systems fail to recognize them properly so that CAAD systems are unable to match left-hand-side conditions of shape rules. More unfortunately, as a result, current CAAD systems fail to retrieve right-hand-side actions. In this paper, multi-layered neural networks are constructed to solve the recognition and transformation of ill-processed shapes in the light of recent advances of connectionism in cognitive psychology and artificial intelligence.
keywords	Shape Recognition, Shape Transformation, Connectionist Models, PDP Models, Content-Addressable Memory, Neural Networks
series	CAAD Futures
email
last changed	2003/05/16 20:58

_id	4203
authors	Fraser, Michael
year	1993
title	Boundary Representation in Practice
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.acadia.1993.173
source	Education and Practice: The Critical Interface [ACADIA Conference Proceedings / ISBN 1-880250-02-0] Texas (Texas / USA) 1993, pp. 173-185
summary	There is an essential contradiction between the making of buildings or built environments in a threedimensional modeler and the graphic control of this process. Three-dimensional modeling is a constructive activity, in which solids are assembled as they would be in an actual structure; it benefits the designer. Presentation and documentation, on the other hand, are prescriptive activities that direct some of the construction and all the visualization and criticism of the proposal; they benefit the user and builder. A building while being designed can be visualized and criticized from its solid model, and the model can take a variety of forms depending on its part): computer-based, drawn in orthographic or perspective projection, constructed of cardboard or wood, or described narratively by means of text, programmatic data, performance model or animation. However, practicing architecture is the process of recording and communicating the decision making process and the contractual obligations that result. In actual practice, in contrast to the designer directed ideal, more participants are brought in sooner at the beginning of a project and with more publicity, which in turn means keeping more, not fewer, records. As the profession evolves, records of the string of design decisions will become more automated, more carefully structured and more retrievable. More buildings will be "tracked" and exposed to review in this way because public environmental sensitivity will improve. The communication between a single designer and his own thoughts will become less and less important.
series	ACADIA
last changed	2022/06/07 07:50

_id	56de
authors	Handa, M., Hasegawa, Y., Matsuda, H., Tamaki, K., Kojima, S., Matsueda, K., Takakuwa, T. and Onoda, T.
year	1996
title	Development of interior finishing unit assembly system with robot: WASCOR IV research project report
source	Automation in Construction 5 (1) (1996) pp. 31-38
summary	The WASCOR (WASeda Construction Robot) research project was organized in 1982 by Waseda University, Tokyo, Japan, aiming at automatizing building construction with a robot. This project is collaborated by nine general contractors and a construction machinery manufacturer. The WASCOR research project has been divided into four phases with the development of the study and called WASCOR I, II, III, and IV respectively. WASCOR I, II, and III finished during the time from 1982 to 1992 in a row with having 3-4 years for each phase, and WASCOR IV has been continued since 1993. WASCOR IV has been working on a automatized building interior finishing system. This system consists of following three parts. (1) Development of building system and construction method for automated interior finishing system. (2) Design of hardware system applied to automated interior finishing system. (3) Design of information management system in automated construction. As the research project has been developing, this paper describes the interim report of (1) Development of building system and construction method for automated interior finishing system, and (2) Design of hardware system applied to automated interior finishing system.
series	journal paper
more	http://www.elsevier.com/locate/autcon
last changed	2003/05/15 21:22

_id	be5c
authors	Wallace, D.R. and Jakiela, M.J.
year	1993
title	Automated product concept design: unifying aesthetics and engineering
source	IEEE Computer Graphics & Applications (July 1993) 66-75
summary	An experimental computer-aided design tool that actively assists in conceptual industrial design of consumer electronics products with injection-molded housings is discussed. This concept phase design tool uses manufacturing, ergonomic, aesthetic, and styling considerations to improve the entire product development process. The model's organization level performs spatial partitioning of components. The surfacing level generates an enclosure for product design. The third level adds style-specific details, and the fourth level applies graphical elements such as color or decals. Examples are presented to show that the system can create designs both meaningful to humans and distinctive in style over a range of products.
series	journal paper
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	ea5a
authors	Wojtowicz, J., Papazian, P., Fargas, J., Davidson, J.N. and Cheng, N.
year	1993
title	Asynchronous Architecture
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.acadia.1993.107
source	Education and Practice: The Critical Interface [ACADIA Conference Proceedings / ISBN 1-880250-02-0] Texas (Texas / USA) 1993, pp. 107-117
summary	Computer culture creates new demands on the process of making architecture. Both academia and practice are undergoing rapid changes due to the impact of information technology, and one of the most significant phenomena which has resulted from this transformation is collaborative design in a networked environment. Many researchers in the field have focused their efforts on minimizing or eliminating an apparent shortcoming of networked collaboration, namely the difficulty of immediate interaction between participants [Maher, Gero and Sand, 1993]. In an ongoing experiment in collaborative design we have taken a different approach. Instead of trying to work in a synchronous environment, we have taken the asynchronous nature of networked collaboration to be one of the important features of this ethereal medium, a feature whose consequences need to be explored.
series	ACADIA
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:57

_id	a336
authors	Calvo, Charles M.
year	1993
title	SOME EPISTEMOLOGICAL CONCERNS REGARDING ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND KNOWLEDGE-BASED APPROACHES TO ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN - A RENEWED AGENDA
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.acadia.1993.155
source	Education and Practice: The Critical Interface [ACADIA Conference Proceedings / ISBN 1-880250-02-0] Texas (Texas / USA) 1993, pp. 155-162
summary	It has been noted that designers - when confronted with computers - have, by and large, refused to accept the introduction of apparently new design methodologies, and it has been speculated that this is the result of a failure of those methodologies to address the cognitive processes which take place in the course of designing. This position is somewhat suspect in that such innovations as computer-aided drafting -which also fail to recognize these processes have been widely accepted. It is perhaps more likely that the lack of acceptance results from a perception on the part of designers that the new methodologies either do not reflect some or all of those concerns that designers consider fundamental to design, or that they actively interfere with the designer's ability to accomplish what he/she sees as the goals of design. Given that the application of artificial intelligence and related work to architecture is still in its infancy, all of this suggests the need for a reassessment of the role of computing in design in order to clarify and strengthen those roles deemed appropriate. Two approaches to the integration of artificial intelligence and knowledge-based systems into architectural design practice are currently dominant. One attempts to create systems which can on their own produce designs, the other provides intelligent support for those doing design. It was, in part, the recognition of limitations in the ability of traditional CAD systems and building modelers to reflect what designers actually do that led to explorations into the idea of intelligent assistants. Development of such assistants was aided by research into the act and process of design through protocol and other studies. Although some work is currently being done in the development of artificial intelligence and knowledge based applications in architecture, and work continues to be done on the study of design methodologies, the bulk of available information in each of these areas remains in the realm of design disciplines related to but outside of architecture and do not reflect the explicit role of architectural design in the embodiment and expression of culture. The relationship of intelligence to culture has resulted in some skepticism regarding the ultimate capacity of neural nets and symbolically programmed computers in general. Significant work has been done questioning the rational tradition in computer development for its failure to address phenomena which are not easily subject to scientific analysis. Further skepticism regarding the role of artificial intelligence and knowledge-based or expert systems in architectural design has been emerging recently. Such criticism tends to focus on two issues: the nature of drawing as an activity which involves both the generation and interpretation of graphic artifacts, and the nature of the human designer as an active agent in the design process.
series	ACADIA
type	normal paper
last changed	2022/06/07 07:54

_id	8b38
authors	Do, Ellen Yi-Luen and Gross, Mark D.
year	1998
title	The Sundance Lab- "Design Systems of the Future"
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.acadia.1998.008
source	ACADIA Quarterly, vol. 17, no. 4, pp. 8-10
summary	The last thirty years have seen the development of powerful new tools for architects and planners: CAD, 3D modeling, digital imaging, geographic information systems, and real time animated walkthroughs. That’s just the beginning. Based on our experience with CAD tools, analysis of design practice, and an understanding of computer hardware and software, we’re out to invent the next generation of tools. We think architects should be shakers and makers, not just consumers, of computer aided design. We started the Sundance Lab (for Computing in Design and Planning) in 1993 with a few people and machines. We’ve grown to more than a dozen people (mostly undergraduate students) and a diverse interdisciplinary array of projects. We’ve worked with architects and planners, anthropologists, civil engineers, geographers, computer scientists, and electrical engineers. Our work is about the built environment: its physical form and various information involved in making and inhabiting places. We cover a wide range of topics – from design information management to virtual space, from sketch recognition to design rationale capture, to communication between designer and computer. All start from the position that design is a knowledge based and information rich activity. Explicit representations of design information (knowledge, rationale, and rules) enables us to engage in more intelligent dialogues about design. The following describes some of our projects under various rubrics.
series	ACADIA
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:55

_id	db3b
authors	Faugeras, O.
year	1993
title	Three-dimensional computer vision, a geometric viewpoint
source	MIT press
summary	This monograph by one of the world's leading vision researchers provides a thorough, mathematically rigorous exposition of a broad and vital area in computer vision: the problems and techniques related to three-dimensional (stereo) vision and motion. The emphasis is on using geometry to solve problems in stereo and motion, with examples from navigation and object recognition.
series	other
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	ca14
authors	Gavin, Lesley
year	1993
title	Generative Modelling and Electronic Lego
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.1993.x.q8a
source	[eCAADe Conference Proceedings] Eindhoven (The Netherlands) 11-13 November 1993
summary	This paper shows work exemplifying the further extent of computer capabilities in the field of design. The work stems from a belief that for computers to be used effectively within the architectural profession their utility must stretch far beyond the process of description of geometric data, but be incorporated in the fundamental roots of design: that of conceptual design. Computers can be used to access the knowledge we have and then formulate this knowledge into a working language of design. Computers can be used to generate space and form in accordance with any relationship the designer may choose to set. This allows them to be used from the very conception of design. It is only by working from the very beginning, the very basis of the design of a building that we can fully develop the integration of computers in the construction industry. The work undertaken sets out primarily to explore one of the ways computers could be used in the field of architectural design. In recognition that an important byproduct of any design search is the enhanced understanding of the problem itself, the work was directed towards a particular project. This allowed each stage of thought to be to be considered as it arose and subsequently incorporated into the design model. The work does not attempt to automise the design process but simply tries to explore some of the opportunities offered by computers and see if they can be easily incorporated into the design process offering design solutions that may not otherwise have been considered. The exploration resulted in a simple design process model that incorporates the more accessible and useful aspects of computer technology.
keywords	Generative Modelling, Rule Based Form, Random Factors, Shape Grammars
series	eCAADe
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:50

_id	cb3c
authors	Krishnamurti, Ramesh and Stouffs, Rudi
year	1993
title	Spatial Grammars: Motivation, Comparison, and New Results
source	CAAD Futures ‘93 [Conference Proceedings / ISBN 0-444-89922-7] (Pittsburgh / USA), 1993, pp. 57-74
summary	The paper starts by giving a motivation for studying grammars in design and is based on considerations of style, discovery, and constructive techniques. This paper goes on to survey a variety of spatial grammar formalisms from an implementation standpoint. For each formalism, the salient computational issues pertaining to rule application are discussed. Two aspects of shape grammars are considered in detail: (a) the conditions for reversibility of shape rules, and (b) the recognition of planar shapes.
keywords	Spatial Grammars, Shape Rules, Shape Recognition
series	CAAD Futures
email
last changed	2003/05/16 20:58

_id	078e
authors	Papazian, Pegor
year	1993
title	Incommensurability of Criteria and Focus in Design Generation
source	CAAD Futures ‘93 [Conference Proceedings / ISBN 0-444-89922-7] (Pittsburgh / USA), 1993, pp. 111-125
summary	An approach to developing design systems is presented, informed by the recognition that design criteria are incommensurable. The degree to which an artifact satisfies one criterion cannot be compared to the degree to which it satisfies another. Given this principle, it is not valid to combine different "scores " given to independent features in an evolving design into a global evaluation function. The design framework proposed here represents an alternative to the traditional approaches for combining independent criteria and organizational principles. It is based on the opportunistic nature of designing, the multiplicity of semantics active in a design session, and the dynamics of focus and distraction. By way of illustrating both this characterization of designing and the abstract computational framework on which it is based, a simple system for arranging blocks according to a set of formal massing principles is presented. The massing generator has some important properties that other systems lack, such as dynamism, robustness and the ability to deal with partial designs. Through a comparison with some artificial intelligence methods such as production systems and search, the proposed framework is used as a guideline for developing design systems. This paper focuses on designing as an activity, rather than engaging in an analysis of finished designs with the hope of capturing their syntactic properties. Thus the stress is placed on the generator's behavior, by giving examples of how it converges on a series of design alternatives in a dynamic fashion, avoiding oscillations and blocks.
keywords	Design, Criteria, Opportunism, Focus, CAD
series	CAAD Futures
last changed	1999/04/07 12:03

_id	98bd
authors	Pea, R.
year	1993
title	Practices of Distributed Intelligence and Designs for Education
source	Distributed Cognitions, edited by G. Salomon. New York, NY: CambridgeUniversity Press
summary	v Knowledge is commonly socially constructed, through collaborative efforts... v Intelligence may also be distributed for use in designed artifacts as diverse as physical tools, representations such as diagrams, and computer-user interfaces to complex tasks. v Leont'ev 1978 for activity theory that argues forcibly for the centrality of people-in-action, activity systems, as units of analysis for deepening our understanding of thinking. v Intelligence is distributed: the resources that shape and enable activity are distributed across people, environments, and situations. v Intelligence is accomplished rather than possessed. v Affordance refers to the perceived and actual properties of a thing, primarily those functional properties that determine how the thing could possibly be used. v Norman 1988 on design and psychology - the psychology of everyday things" v We deploy effort-saving strategies in recognition of their cognitive economy and diminished opportunity for error. v The affordances of artifacts may be more or less difficult to convey to novice users of these artifacts in the activities to which they contribute distributed intelligence. v Starts with Norman's seven stages of action Ø Forming a goal; an intention § Task desire - clear goal and intention - an action and a means § Mapping desire - unable to map goal back to action § Circumstantial desire - no specific goal or intention - opportunistic approach to potential new goal § Habitual desire - familiar course of action - rapidly cycle all seven stages of action v Differentiates inscriptional systems from representational or symbol systems because inscriptional systems are completely external, while representational or symbol systems have been used in cognitive science as mental constructs. v The situated properties of everyday cognition are highly inventive in exploiting features of the physical and social situation as resources for performing a task, thereby avoiding the need for mental symbol manipulations unless they are required by that task. v Explicit recognition of the intelligence represented and representable in design, specifically in designed artifacts that play important roles in human activities. v Once intelligence is designed into the affordances properties of artifacts, it both guides and constrains the likely contributions of that artifact to distributed intelligence in activity. v Culturally valued designs for distributed intelligence will change over time, especially as new technology becomes associated with a task domain. v If we treat distributed intelligence in action as the scientific unit of analysis for research and theory on learning and reasoning... Ø What is distributed? Ø What constraints govern the dynamics of such distributions in different time scales? Ø Through what reconfigurations of distributed intelligence might the performance of an activity system improve over time? v Intelligence is manifest in activity and distributed in nature. v Intelligent activities ...in the real world... are often collaborative, depend on resources beyond an individual's long-term memory, and require the use of information-handling tools... v Wartofsky 1979 - the artifact is to cultural evolution what the gene is to biological evolution - the vehicle of information across generations. v Systems of activity - involving persons, environment, tools - become the locus of developmental investigation. v Disagrees with Salomon et al.'s entity-oriented approach - a language of containers holding things. v Human cognition aspires to efficiency in distributing intelligence - across individuals, environment, external symbolic representations, tools, and artifacts - as a means of coping with the complexity of activities we often cal "mental." "
series	other
last changed	2003/04/23 15:14

_id	5e6f
authors	Fudos, Ioannis
year	1993
title	Editable Representations for 2D Geometric Design
source	Purdue University
series	thesis:MSc
email
last changed	2003/02/12 22:37

_id	a12b
authors	Kokosalakis, J., Farrow, J. and Spalton, N.
year	1993
title	Introducing 2D Draughting and 3D CAD Modelling into the Information and Library Studies Curriculum in Response to Increasingly Complex Design Requirements of Information Resources
doi	https://doi.org/10.52842/conf.ecaade.1993.x.q0e
source	[eCAADe Conference Proceedings] Eindhoven (The Netherlands) 11-13 November 1993
summary	This paper describes enhancements to the Information and Library Studies curriculum at the Liverpool John Moores University. In the design process for buildings and space utilised for learning resources informed client involvement is seen as important by the information professional. A new module has been introduced with the aim of providing students with the knowledge and skills to communicate effectively with building design professionals. It is apparent that CAD has a place in this teaching. The programme of study is outlined, including a discussion of significant, relevant examples produced by the CAAD staff of the School of the Built Environment. The teaching methods were drawn from experience in the well established curricula and delivery of CAAD to the architecture and environmental planning students using School of the Built Environment Macintosh hardware and software. From the Aldham Robarts Learning Resource Centre, (presently nearing completion) examples will be shown of animated models, design, organisational and staffing solutions to new technological demands. These include transfer of the Austin - Smith: Lord Intergraph/MicroStation 3D model to Zoom, animation with Electric Image and Theseus and assisting library staff to use ArchiCAD to design and consider shelf planning arrangements for negotiation with the architects. There are interesting lessons to be learned about the advantages of CAD for future client control.
keywords	Information Professional, CAAD, Learning Resource Centre, Open Learning, Information and Library Studies, Curriculum.
series	eCAADe
email
last changed	2022/06/07 07:50

_id	af46
authors	Lue, Q.
year	1993
title	Computer aided descriptive geometry
source	Vienna University of Technology
summary	The main aim of this thesis is the creation of a software package for descriptive geometry. Why there is a need for such a descriptive geometry software? In descriptive geometry the ability of space perception is trained by solving spatial problems graphically with the use of a few constructions: Hence the solution of each problem consists of two parts: 1) 3D-part: After analyzing the spatial problem it is cleared how to proceed step by step in space. 2) 2D-part: Due to the basic rules of descriptive geometry for each step of the solving strategy the corresponding 2D-construction has to be carried out graphically. By use of CAD-DG the 2nd part can be replaced again by a 3D-part: Each step is solved using the basic routines offered in the menu. That means that each step is solved analytically but instead of any output of numbers the solution is immediately displayed in the main views on the screen. Therefore the user neither needs to apply formulas of analytic geometry nor has to take care of any coordinates. He still works directly with geometric objects in a graphic representation
keywords	Descriptive Geometry; Computer Graphics; Education; Interactive Graphic Software Package; Programming Technique; Educational Software
series	thesis:PhD
more	http://www.arcs.ac.at/dissdb/rn020701
last changed	2003/02/12 22:37

_id	sigradi2020_23
id	sigradi2020_23
authors	Patino Mazo, Ever; Vélez-Granda, Sandra Marcela; Jaramillo Florez, Juan David
year	2020
title	Translation of cultural patterns through a "design for emotions" tool and the "Pre-inventive forms" method, into handicraft product design with cultural identity
source	SIGraDi 2020 [Proceedings of the 24th Conference of the Iberoamerican Society of Digital Graphics - ISSN: 2318-6968] Online Conference 18 - 20 November 2020, pp. 23-30
summary	Based on the premise that the form generation phase in the design of handicraft products is one of the most complexes, the article proposes the use of the "Roles of products and users expectations" model by Jacob-Dazarola (2015), and “Pre-inventive 2D and 3D forms” method based on Finke (1993). The methods are evidenced in a case study, in which five handicraft product projects were developed, based on the cultural identity of Guapi, a town in the Colombian Pacific.
keywords	Design for emotions, participatory observation, cultural patterns, pre-inventive forms, handicraft
series	SIGraDi
email
last changed	2021/07/16 11:48

_id	avocaad_2001_16
id	avocaad_2001_16
authors	Yu-Ying Chang, Yu-Tung Liu, Chien-Hui Wong
year	2001
title	Some Phenomena of Spatial Characteristics of Cyberspace
source	AVOCAAD - ADDED VALUE OF COMPUTER AIDED ARCHITECTURAL DESIGN, Nys Koenraad, Provoost Tom, Verbeke Johan, Verleye Johan (Eds.), (2001) Hogeschool voor Wetenschap en Kunst - Departement Architectuur Sint-Lucas, Campus Brussel, ISBN 80-76101-05-1
summary	"Space," which has long been an important concept in architecture (Bloomer & Moore, 1977; Mitchell, 1995, 1999), has attracted interest of researchers from various academic disciplines in recent years (Agnew, 1993; Benko & Strohmayer, 1996; Chang, 1999; Foucault, 1982; Gould, 1998). Researchers from disciplines such as anthropology, geography, sociology, philosophy, and linguistics regard it as the basis of the discussion of various theories in social sciences and humanities (Chen, 1999). On the other hand, since the invention of Internet, Internet users have been experiencing a new and magic "world." According to the definitions in traditional architecture theories, "space" is generated whenever people define a finite void by some physical elements (Zevi, 1985). However, although Internet is a virtual, immense, invisible and intangible world, navigating in it, we can still sense the very presence of ourselves and others in a wonderland. This sense could be testified by our naming of Internet as Cyberspace -- an exotic kind of space. Therefore, as people nowadays rely more and more on the Internet in their daily life, and as more and more architectural scholars and designers begin to invest their efforts in the design of virtual places online (e.g., Maher, 1999; Li & Maher, 2000), we cannot help but ask whether there are indeed sensible spaces in Internet. And if yes, these spaces exist in terms of what forms and created by what ways?To join the current interdisciplinary discussion on the issue of space, and to obtain new definition as well as insightful understanding of "space", this study explores the spatial phenomena in Internet. We hope that our findings would ultimately be also useful for contemporary architectural designers and scholars in their designs in the real world.As a preliminary exploration, the main objective of this study is to discover the elements involved in the creation/construction of Internet spaces and to examine the relationship between human participants and Internet spaces. In addition, this study also attempts to investigate whether participants from different academic disciplines define or experience Internet spaces in different ways, and to find what spatial elements of Internet they emphasize the most.In order to achieve a more comprehensive understanding of the spatial phenomena in Internet and to overcome the subjectivity of the members of the research team, the research design of this study was divided into two stages. At the first stage, we conducted literature review to study existing theories of space (which are based on observations and investigations of the physical world). At the second stage of this study, we recruited 8 Internet regular users to approach this topic from different point of views, and to see whether people with different academic training would define and experience Internet spaces differently.The results of this study reveal that the relationship between human participants and Internet spaces is different from that between human participants and physical spaces. In the physical world, physical elements of space must be established first; it then begins to be regarded as a place after interaction between/among human participants or interaction between human participants and the physical environment. In contrast, in Internet, a sense of place is first created through human interactions (or activities), Internet participants then begin to sense the existence of a space. Therefore, it seems that, among the many spatial elements of Internet we found, "interaction/reciprocity" Ñ either between/among human participants or between human participants and the computer interface Ð seems to be the most crucial element.In addition, another interesting result of this study is that verbal (linguistic) elements could provoke a sense of space in a degree higher than 2D visual representation and no less than 3D visual simulations. Nevertheless, verbal and 3D visual elements seem to work in different ways in terms of cognitive behaviors: Verbal elements provoke visual imagery and other sensory perceptions by "imagining" and then excite personal experiences of space; visual elements, on the other hand, provoke and excite visual experiences of space directly by "mapping".Finally, it was found that participants with different academic training did experience and define space differently. For example, when experiencing and analyzing Internet spaces, architecture designers, the creators of the physical world, emphasize the design of circulation and orientation, while participants with linguistics training focus more on subtle language usage. Visual designers tend to analyze the graphical elements of virtual spaces based on traditional painting theories; industrial designers, on the other hand, tend to treat these spaces as industrial products, emphasizing concept of user-center and the control of the computer interface.The findings of this study seem to add new information to our understanding of virtual space. It would be interesting for future studies to investigate how this information influences architectural designers in their real-world practices in this digital age. In addition, to obtain a fuller picture of Internet space, further research is needed to study the same issue by examining more Internet participants who have no formal linguistics and graphical training.
series	AVOCAAD
email
last changed	2005/09/09 10:48

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