1. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 1 Information Interoperability for Engineering and Construction Supply Chain Kincho H. Law, Gio Wiederhold, Charles Han, Jack Cheng

2. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 2 The big idea Information Mapping and Integration Information Mapping and Integration, which can be leveraged to - establish a network of information and services for AEC virtual supply chain - facilitate the virtual design and construction process - enhance collaboration, decision-making and cost saving.

3. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 3 Motivating Engineering/Business Problem Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding Owner Subcontractors General Contractor Architect/ Design Consultants Suppliers Current AEC Supply Chain Courtesy: Hans Bjornsson Scattered information sources Fragmented SC Different hardware and software Different information models

4. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 4 Inevitable Need for Data Exchange Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding 3D Models in Autodesk ADTeQUEST Model for HVAC IFC gbXML ???

5. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 5 Consequences Lack of information reuse and sharing Decreased corporation and system accountability and transparency Increased lead-time Reduced customer service level Can it be improved? Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

6. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 6 Points of Departure Information Interoperability is often neglected in a network of systems ( e.g. supply chain network, workflow network )Information Interoperability is often neglected in a network of systems ( e.g. supply chain network, workflow network ) A single, unifying standard model is commonly builtA single, unifying standard model is commonly built Mapping between different standards is now manualMapping between different standards is now manual Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

7. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 7 Online Web Services 1: Integrating Online Catalog with CAD and Inventory Management Architectural Design Inventory Management Automated Procurement Web Services Web Service Gateway Deployed Suppliers Web Services Further Simulation Availability Check Order & Invoice Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding Autodesk i-drop Automated Workflow/ Supply Chain Information Interoperability

8. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 8 Online Web Services 2: Integrating Online Weather Service to Engineering Simulation Microsoft Excel Autodesk ADT …… …… Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding Information Interoperability

9. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 9 Point of Departure (2/3) Unified Information Models Building a single, unifying model of concepts and definitions is neither efficient nor practical [Source: Steve Ray (Division Chief, NIST Manufacturing Systems Integration Division) ] Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding BIM Product, process, organization information Design, analysis, procurement, installation, etc. linked Separated yet linked models, differentiated by types and scopes

10. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 10 Multiple information standards or data model structures in AEC industry: –Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) –OmniClass Construction Classification System –CIMsteel Integration Standards (CIS/2) –Automating Equipment Information Exchange (AEX) –UniFormat TM –MasterFormat TM –etc. Mapping is now done manually by domain experts –Time-consuming –Labor-intensive –Ineffecient Point of Departure (3/3) Manual Information Mapping Between Standards Mapping is needed for model rebuilding and data exchange purpose… Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

11. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 11 Manual Mapping CIS/2 and IFC for Structural Steel Reference: Lipman (2006) CIS/2 IFC Took 2 Years! Located_part Coord_system_cartesian_3d Section_profile IfcColumn IfcLocalPlacement IfcShapeProfileDef Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

12. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 12 Research Methods Two basic work packages: –Knowledge-Driven Approach for Semantic Similarity Comparison  Discover similarity of concepts  “Harmonize” different ontological standards –Methodologies to Information Transformation and Integration  Formal operations for mapping  Information across scopes and applications  Web service framework Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

13. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 13 Making Use of Ontology Ontology – Terminology and structure of information sources  meaningful information exchange and sharing Gartner Group*: “By 2010, ontologies ….will be the basis for 80 percent of application integration projects” Heterogeneous Representation of Ontologies: Term Difference (Elevator vs. Lift) View/Contextual Difference (Transportation vs. Equipment) Schema Difference (BPEL vs. PSL vs. WSML vs. etc.) Version Difference (IfcWorkTask – IFC 2.0 vs. IfcTask – IFC 2x) Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding *Jacobs, J. and Linden (2002), A. Semantic Web Technologies Take Middleware to the Next Level, Technical Report T- 17-5338, Gartner Group.

14. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 14 Mediation for Information Articulation Mediation  semantic differences of formats Metadata (ontology) are defined and extracted Source Domain 1: Owned and maintained by Organization A Source Domain 2: Owned and maintained by Organization B Result contains shared terms Terms useful for linking rules Mediation Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding Metadata Text-mining Data-mining Information Articulation Courtesy: Gio Wiederhold Knowledge Corpus

15. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 15 Semantic Comparison Between OmniClass and ifcXML Regulation Set (International Building Code, IBC) Ontology 1 (OmniClass)Ontology 2 (ifcXML) IfcSlab steel Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding Source Domain 1 Source Domain 2 Knowledge Corpus for Mediation

16. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 16 Knowledge-Driven Approach for Semantic Similarity Comparison [F] 903.4.2 Alarms. Approved audible devices shall be connected to every automatic sprinkler system. Such sprinkler water-flow alarm devices shall be activated by water flow equivalent to the flow of a single sprinkler of the smallest orifice size installed in the system. Alarm devices shall be provided on the exterior of the building in an approved location. Where a fire alarm system is installed, actuation of the automatic sprinkler system shall actuate the building fire alarm system. sprinkler system orifice O1 fire alarm O1 water flow O2 fire alarm system O2 Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

17. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 17 Information Transformation and Integration Migration of data: –In same domain (e.g. MasterFormat to UniFormat, proprietary schemas to open standards) –Across disciplines (e.g. green building information with product geometry information) Form – physical structure and content Fit – entity’s semantics or meaning Function – purpose of how the entity is used Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding Sellers Suppliers (Form, Fit, Function) Product cost (buyer) [obtain and store] Product cost (suppliers) (Form, Fit) [produce and store] Product cost (suppliers) (Form, Function) [price it sells the item] ???

18. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 18 Relationship to CIFE Goals Engineering Modeling Methods: –Modeling of product, process and organization data for information exchange and sharing Analysis Methods: –Establishment of formal methodologies and operations to solve the information interoperability problem Business Metrics: –Support for information flow and global supply chain Strategic Management: –Integration of distributed information and services for decision-making Economic Impact Analysis: –Cost saving because of efficient collaboration between stakeholders and interoperation among heterogeneous applications Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

19. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 19 Research Tasks, Schedule and Milestone 20072008 Autumn QuarterWinter QuarterSpring QuarterSummer Quarter Define and develop methodologies for the mediation tools, and the information interoperability infrastructure Implement and test the information interoperability result with a simple procurement supply chain application Define and scope a series of case scenarios with increasing complexity with collaborators (e.g. NIST, GSA) Demonstrate a set of case scenarios of modest scale with a Web service framework and solicit feedback Validation and calibration of the information system will be an ongoing activity Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding Deliverables

20. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 20 Risks Establishment of a comprehensive information system infrastructure is a task beyond a 1- or 2-year seed research proposal We will make use of: –Pilot project leading to fundamental understanding –Collaborations with other researchers and their organizations Publications: –J. Cheng, C. P. Cheng, M. A. L. Thi, and K. H. Law. "Engineering Simulations with Web-based Services," Proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Computing in Civil and Building Engineering, (ICCCBE XI), Montreal, Canada, June 14-16, 2006. –C. P. Cheng, G. T. Lau, J. Pan, K. H. Law, and A. Jones "Domain-Specific Ontology Mapping by Corpus-Based Semantic Similarity," Scientific Foundations Workshop of End-to-End Service Utility (E2ESU), NIST, Gaithersburg, MD, USA, March 22-23, 2007. –C. P. Cheng, G. T. Lau, and K. H. Law "Mapping Regulations to Industry-Specific Taxonomies" 11th International Conference on Artificial Intelligence and Law, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, USA, June 4-8, 2007. Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

21. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 21 External Involvement Potential Interest from industry organizations and government agencies Collaborations: –Prof. Hans Bjornsson (Chalmers, Sweden and UC Merced) –Dr. Robert Lipman (NIST, IAI’s ifc & CIS/2 Interoperability project) –Dr. Mark Palmer (NIST, FIATECH’s AEX Interoperability project) –Dr. Albert Jones (NIST Enterprise Systems Group) –Mr. Dave Conover (International Code Council) –Dr. Calvin Kam (GSA) –others... (for example, ENSURE partners with EU researchers) Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

22. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 22 Potential Funding Sources Key initiative at various agencies: NSF, NIST, FIATECH, EU Framework 7, etc. NIST (as well as FIATECH): –“Information interoperability and supply chain management” is the upcoming key initiative –Established strong collaboration with NIST  Further funding support is anticipated Motivating ProblemPoint of DepartureSemantic SimilarityInformation MappingCIFE Goals Plan, Risk, Funding

23. Copyright  2007 Information Interoperability for Supply Chain CIFE TAC 2007 23