AEC Tech News (#210)

Snapshots from West Coast Green

San Francisco hosts green building technology and material vendors.

Last week, a block away from San Francisco’s city hall, green building technology vendors and material suppliers set up shop inside the Bill Graham Civic Auditorium for the West Coast Green Conference and Exposition to promote the use of green construction methods in the residential market. Walking around the trade show booths, attendees marveled at the walls from NanaWall, lumber and flooring products from TerraMai, and the solar-powered heating apparatuses from TrendSetter, not just for their aesthetics but for their energy-efficiency and environment-friendly features. Even the Canadian Consulate kept a booth -- quiet, unobtrusive, but visible -- to promote the green engineering services available in the land of the maple leaves.

Green Building Studio v3 in Beta
Green Building Studio (GBS), a local company that has made energy analysis as easy as uploading a CAD file, attracted a steady stream of visitors at its booth. Based in Santa Rosa, California, GBS was previously an energy efficiency research and development consultancy known as GeoPraxis. On September 1, 2005, the company officially adopted the name of its most successful software product, GBS, as its business name. GBS, available as a Web-based energy analysis platform, converts CAD models from Autodesk Revit, Graphisoft ArchiCAD, and other CAD programs into the open gbXML (Green Building XML) schema to process and deliver load, energy, and thermal analysis reports. Though the gbXML format originated from GBS, it’s now maintained by a consortium of leading BIM (building information modeling) tool vendors, according to the company. Read more>>

Solutions from Synergis (Column): Confused Point Disorder in Civil 3D

By Bill Frederick

Why do your points act the way they do and where did they go? Don't suffer through Confused Point Disorder when you don't have to. Confused Point Disorder has been an interesting topic surrounding Civil 3D. In past releases (before 2008), points and point groups behaved much differently. This month, we'll explore the basics of points and some of the differences between software releases. Read more>>

AutoCAD Architecture Test Drives
Various Dates September through November
Various U.S. Cities
Avatech Test Drives are designed for people who would like a chance to try out the technology quickly and easily with the guidance of experienced professionals. Autodesk-certified experts and industry leading instructors will walk attendees through some of the basic and more advanced functionality in each of Autodesk's latest versions of AutoCAD Architecture, Revit Architecture, Revit Structure, Revit MEP, and Autodesk VIZ. Read more

Civil 3D Test Drives
September 14 - November 16, 2007
Various U.S. Cities
Avatech Solutions invites civil engineers and others who use CAD software for infrastructure design, drafting, and surveying work to test drive AutoCAD Civil 3D 2008 in a series of hands-on training sessions across the country this fall. Avatech's Autodesk Civil 3D Implementation Certified Experts and industry leading instructors will walk attendees through some of the basic functionality and workflows in Civil 3D.
Read more

Webinar: Visualizing Bridges
October 9, 2007
8:00 a.m. PDT
The objective of this Webinar series is to provide knowledge, expertise, and suitable tools for civil engineers to employ visualization as a cost-effective solution throughout the project design process. This session, presented by RDV Systems, will cover extruding the bridge shape, barriers, guard rails, columns, and bridge heads. Read more

Webinar: Visualizing Tunnels
October 23, 2007
8:00 a.m. PDT
RDV Systems presents live Webinar sessions that will take a task-oriented approach aimed at solving everyday, real-life visualization challenges that face civil engineers and land planners. This session will cover extruding the tunnel shape, portals, and using transparency.
Read more

BIM Best Practices Training
December 11, 2007
Washington, D.C.
At this workshop, which will take place at the Ecobuild America Fall Conference, leading U.S. architecture and design firms; the U.S. Commercial Service, U.S. Department of Commerce; and the General Services Administration will discuss how they are using BIM in their U.S. and international projects to create innovative designs and solve client problems. Read more

For Cadalyst's full calendar of events, click here.