An Augmented Frame Representation for Building Designs

We are developing an intelligent interface for the many design evaluation programs becoming available in architecture. As the central part of this project we have developed a model of buildings, capable of holding all the information needed to describe a building to a number of design tools commonly used by architects. The model also contains knowledge about components in a building and their inter-relationships. This paper examines the applicability of frame systems for representing the different types of information and structures that exist in a building, including declarative knowledge about buildings and heuristics about building design. An extension to the frames system is described which allows the designer to simultaneously model, compare and contrast many design alternatives for a single building. A frame system of this type has been devised for this project. Its low level structure and the methods used to encapsulate declarative and heuristic knowledge about buildings are described. In the conclusion the fit between our augmented frames system models and the knowledge required to represent buildings is evaluated.