ABSTRACT
This chapter describes a suite of integrated design tools developed for the Cooperative Research Centre for Construction Innovation. This suite of software is indicative of the type of software platform that will be standard for the design firm of the future. It has been built around the concept of ‘interoperability’, where each separate computer program supports one type of activity. The intention is that the information produced in one program will then be available for other programs to access through a publicly available information exchange specification. The Industry Foundation Classes (IFCs) are the information exchange specification that was used throughout these projects. The IFCs were developed by the International Alliance for Interoperability, also known as BuildingSMART (IAI 2007).
