Also another big difference between any of the manufacturing industries and architecture is that those manufacturer's design and perfect one "drawing / model / document" and then can make many of them in a very controlled environment, often starting out knowing who all the individual subcontractors are going to be. Thus it is beneficial for them to invest in a tightly organized and coordinated "drawing / model / document" beforehand.

Buildings on the other hand, are done only once, in one iteration from design through permitting through construction. There are countless number of real world problems along the process and they get solved by the most efficient method at the given time by the given party who is involved at that moment. This could be the architect, engineer, city planner, general contractor, sub, etc.

I really don't think the way we do buildings will change any time soon. It doesn't matter how well we do the document, it only gets built once, so there really is no justification to invest so much into it, and therefore no one will. It is only valuable as much as it is beneficial to the individual architect / engineer / contractor at the time, and for now, my MEP engineers and structural engineers have hard enough time surviving, using the lowest paid drafters to draft in the most efficient way they know, which is AutoCAD. Contractors? No, they are perfectly happy to have rolls of drawings at the job site. Anything unclear, then just ask the architect. They are not going to hire someone to model the project in 3D or spin around a 3D model in front of a computer screen to figure out what to do.

In conclusion, I think the focus of the BIM developers should be to really streamline the process for the individual architect / engineering firm FIRST. Not just for the high end, super big project kind of firms, but every day architect / engineer who does additions here, strip center there, etc. When it is easier / faster for an electrical engineer to document something like a office T.I. in BIM, and easier for an architect / designer to document a house addition, then I think we can start to think about bigger things for BIM at that time.

Don't even get into FM uses. The FM industry (of which my firm is a part) as a whole seems to have disintegrated. CAFM (Computer Aided Facilities Management) software is truly a mess. You have a choice between dinosaurs like Archibus (basically an AutoCAD add-on with an SQL link) and monsters like MicroMain. We used Aperture for a long time, until the company decided to completely drop it for a $300,000 FM system. So now it is dead code. Autodesk has a relatively new entry, but no one trusts it yet. Even Graphisoft had one, and let it go. There is no clear standard at all, and definitely no interoperability. And we thought BIM was a disaster!

Da3dalus wrote:
I'm afraid that the wish for simple, complete, and cohesive file sharing without need for tweaking is going to be a real tough issue in BIM. They haven't gotten it right in DWG! I mostly work in AutoCAD at the moment, and there are still compatibility issues... with other AutoCAD consultants! There are 2 problems:
1. We use the least-paid staff to do the majority of our drafting, and
2. AutoCAD, ArchiCAD, and most other programs allow for a great deal of customization to fit each office individually.

The answer? Make CAD/BIM software a dictatorship with only one workflow (layer sets, notation types, etc.), and only allow your experienced staff operate it. Unfortunately, no one would buy it because that is impossible.

The REAL answer: do the best you can to coordinate with consultants up front, and figure in time to polish the information you receive for your own uses. It will never be a completely automated solution.

The DELTA SERVER isn't going to be as complicated or as intrusive as your nightmares might lead you to believe. As well as the fact that you guys are talking about two different types of systems. A remote sever and your desktop machine. The delta server is your machine.