No abstract

Cultural heritage building information models (HBIMs) incorporate specific geometric and semantic data that are mandatory for supporting the workflows and decision making during a heritage study. The Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) open data exchange standard can be used to migrate these data between different software solutions as an openBIM approach, and has the potential to mitigate data loss. Specific data-exchange scenarios can be supported by firstly developing an Information Delivery Manual (IDM) and subsequently filtering portions of the IFC schema and producing a specialized Model View Definition (MVD). This paper showcases the creation of a specialized IDM for the heritage domain in consultation with experts in the restoration and preservation of built heritage. The IDM was then translated into a pilot MVD for heritage. We tested our developments on an HBIM case study, where a historic building was semantically enriched with information about the case study’s conservation plan and then checked against the specified IDM requirements using the developed MVD. We concluded that the creation of an IDM and then the MVD for the heritage domain are achievable and will bring us one step closer to BIM standardisation in the field of digitised cultural buildings.

The paper reports on the buildingSMART International project IFC-Bridge that developed an extension of the vendor-neutral data exchange standard Industry Foundation Classes (IFC). The paper highlights the importance of a well-defined development process and the involvement of an international expert panel. It also discusses the need to focus on "low hanging fruits" by considering only the most widespread bridge types and implementing the data exchange scenarios that provide the most benefit. The paper describes both the development process and the outcome-the actual extension of the IFC standard. In this regard, emphasis is given to the general principles of extending IFC, such as minimizing the number of new entities.

The transfer of design data into nature is a necessary task during the construction process. For this, the geodetic Coordinate Reference System (gCRS) used during the design process needs to be accounted for and the distortions included need to be handled appropriately. In the context of Building Information Modelling (BIM) and the vendor-neutral data format Industry Foundation Classes (IFC), the gCRS represents an important metadata item of the model which is included and maintained throughout the project's lifetime. Although the IFC4 supports gCRSs by providing the option to refer to an identifier of the European Petroleum Survey Group (EPSG) database, it is not able to handle custom gCRSs, which can be defined for large infrastructure projects, such as the Brenner Base Tunnel (BBT). We highlight these deficiencies of the schema and propose a novel approach by expanding the IFC schema with the Well-Known Text (WKT) notation.

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