Architectural Design Changes Research Articles

Design for excellence (DfX) for high-rise modular buildings: from DfX considerations to module design guidelines using the case of Hong Kong

ABSTRACT Design for excellence (DfX) presents a significant opportunity for early design to ensure the efficiency and buildability of high-rise modular buildings and realize their multidimensional benefits. Previous DfX contributions have primarily concentrated on its conception, offering various considerations from downstream construction stakeholders. Little research has integrated and transformed them into more practical, ready-to-use guidelines for upstream design professionals. This research, therefore, aims to incorporate prevailing piecemeal DfX considerations and establish module design guidelines. The guidelines were initially developed based on prior literature and case study, and their alignment with existing practices was subsequently tested. They recommend 1) a simplified rectangular module shape, 2) suggested module size, 3) standardized space across projects, and 4) dimensional coordination among modules and spaces. By utilizing them to analyze 39 high-rise module designs in Hong Kong, the results reveal some similarities between the proposed guidelines and real-world practices, affirming their concurrent validity and creating warrant assertions. This research bridges the knowledge gap between upstream and downstream practitioners, offers transformed DfX knowledge to systematically guide future implementations, and finally explains changes in architectural design. Future studies are advised to fine-tune the guidelines and incorporate findings with computational technologies to enhance generative DfX.

Building and living in Tlemcen (Algeria). From the traditional house to the colonial villa

Domestic architecture in the city of Tlemcen knew changes in architectural design and construction techniques over time, from prehistoric times, through the succession of Islamic dynasties, the colonial era and the current period. Individual housing during the colonial period was marked by the transition from the traditional patio house to suburban housing and individual villas with courtyards and gardens. A comparative study was carried out of a traditional Ottoman house in Bab El Hadid and a colonial villa in the avenue Allée des Pins. It reveals two architectural styles from two different eras, designed for two populations with different lifestyles, and highlights the traditional and modern construction techniques and materials used.

Modern façade technologies and media architecture

Modern human is wrapped up in the virtual world of digital technologies. The lifestyle is changing and the requirements for the existing urban development are changing too. The architect has to look for new ways to create the appearance of modern architecture to attract attention to the surrounding reality. Innovative materials and digital technologies are actively used in architecture nowadays. Modern facade technologies are used for creating media architecture. By means of modern facade technologies new horizons in architecture are opening up, but the architect lacks sufficient experience in working with them. Professional duty forces us to master modern facade technologies in order to fully use them, anticipate dangerous points and be a participant in the ongoing changes in architectural design.

Houses amid COVID-19: Environmental challenges and design adaptation

Pandemics recur every 30 to 40 years. Every pandemic that has ever occurred brings changes in architectural design. This study conducts a literature study of the effect of pandemics on adaptation of the design of the artificial environment. Particularly the influence of the Covid-19 pandemic on changes in human behavior and its adaptation to residential architectural designs. In this paper, a qualitative approach with descriptive analysis methods is used to get a deep and a very basic understanding based on the problem being observed. The uncertain conditions of the Covid-19 pandemic have resulted in humans realizing that they cannot avoid the spread of this virus, so that a new environment and lifestyle are formed to live with this virus in a better way. During Covid-19, a house must adapt so it can effectively protect its residents from infectious diseases and facilitate all activities that were previously carried out outside the house. Some of the adaptations needed for residential design during this pandemic are in: housing characteristics; housing layout; interior, building material and furniture; natural lighting and indoor air quality; exterior, outdoor, and landscape; and value.

Mediterranean determinism in the architecture of Alvaro Siza and Eduardo Soto de Moura

Appearance of modernism in the history of architecture was marked by revolutionary changes in architectural design and very radical break with previous practices and aesthetic styles-oriented approach. From modernism architecture declared more functional, rational and human oriented ideas. However, the wish to establish universal values in design all around the world, has resulted with same or very similar architecture disconnected from context and all its parameters. Nevertheless, during the all time of modernism, some of the most important representatives of the movement were aware of specific importance of context and its relations with proper architectural design. The Mediterranean area had very particular role in this attitude, during the entire modernist history of 20th century, but especially after postmodernism with reincarnation of modernist ideas in the form of neo-modernism. Such revival of pure, functionalist and minimalist design was accompanied with new "genius loci" orientation and full respect to traditional, social, climate, topography and natural aspects of architectural context. Some of the most prominent representatives of this approach are two Portuguese architects, both awarded by the Pritzker Prize for Architecture; Alvaro Siza and Eduardo Soto de Moura, which work and study cases of some of their projects could be relevant examples and proof of value and adjustment possibilities of modernist ideas in accordance to architect's creativity and wish to respect all the particularities of any site.

Mediterranean determinism in the architecture of Alvaro Siza and Eduardo Soto de Moura

Appearance of modernism in the history of architecture was marked by revolutionary changes in architectural design and very radical break with previous practices and aesthetic styles-oriented approach. From modernism architecture declared more functional, rational and human oriented ideas. However, the wish to establish universal values in design all around the world, has resulted with same or very similar architecture disconnected from context and all its parameters. Nevertheless, during the all time of modernism, some of the most important representatives of the movement were aware of specific importance of context and its relations with proper architectural design. The Mediterranean area had very particular role in this attitude, during the entire modernist history of 20th century, but especially after postmodernism with reincarnation of modernist ideas in the form of neo-modernism. Such revival of pure, functionalist and minimalist design was accompanied with new genius loci orientation and full respect to traditional, social, climate, topography and natural aspects of architectural context. Some of the most prominent representatives of this approach are two Portuguese architects, both awarded by the Pritzker Prize for Architecture; Alvaro Siza and Eduardo Soto de Moura, which work and study cases of some of their projects could be relevant examples and proof of value and adjustment possibilities of modernist ideas in accordance to architect's creativity and wish to respect all the particularities of any site.

Works of Karol Jankowski (1868-1928), Czesław Przybylski (1880-1936) and Rudolf Świerczyński (1883-1943) as the background for the changes in architectural design teaching at the Faculty of Architecture of Warsaw University of Technology in the 1920s

The 20th century Polish architecture reached its turning point in the middle of the 1920s, a decade after the creation of the Faculty of Architecture at Warsaw University of Technology and soon after Poland had regained its independence. National forms emphasizing the autonomy and distinctiveness of Polish architecture were sought for and enhanced, which is characteristic of the first years of the Warsaw school of architecture. New aesthetic trends of the artistic avant-garde hailing from the West changed the perception of architecture. New, modern architectural perspectives were particularly enthusiastically received by the youngest generation of architectural adepts. Striving for simplicity, for purist forms, was related to the construction and logic of the materials used. Changes in the didactics that emphasised the significance of technical subjects and design resulted in a much more rationalistic approach to the problems of architectural design. These changes are also visible in the works of the professors - practitioners who at that time ran the Architectural Design Departments at the Faculty of Architecture at WUT. Using the works of Karol Jankowski, Czesław Przybylski and Rudolf Świerczyński as the example, I would like to present changes not only in the artistic approaches of the leading creators of Polish architecture of that period, but also those affecting the teaching at the Warsaw school of architecture. As the body of the written texts left by these outstanding teachers is relatively scant, their work remained the most powerful form of expression while assimilating innovative currents of the 1920s - a synthesis of their views and ideas contained directly in their architectural works.

Mathematical Modeling of Command-and-Control Strategies in Crowd Movement

Mathematical models and solution frameworks are described for the assessment of command-and-control strategies in the centralized coordination of crowd movement. The effectiveness of several strategies–-from providing only information to reconfiguring the built environment through architectural design changes and forcing pedestrians to follow system-optimal evacuation routes–-is investigated and compared with the use of proposed mathematical formulations and computational solutions. These formulations and solutions are tested on an example network as an illustration. Differences in system performance under these strategies are assessed, and performance (as total travel time) is compared. Efficiency gains obtained with command-and-control strategies in crowd movement are investigated.

Design exploration of a NVM based hybrid instruction memory organization for embedded platforms

Non volatile memory (NVM) technologies are being explored extensively to replace conventional SRAM based memories. The main focus of this paper is the exploration of a NVM based instruction memory in low power embedded systems for wireless or multimedia target applications. A SRAM based traditional instruction memory organization suitable for the target applications is taken as the base. Different Resistive RAM (ReRAM) based organizations are then designed as alternatives keeping in mind their limitations (write process related), and energy and performance trade-offs. The NVM array design is explored and optimized based on energy and performance trade-offs. Dynamic instruction mapping and architectural design changes are utilized to minimize ReRAM limitations and maximize its positive contributions. Energy and performance values are obtained by extension of CACTI models, Spice and VHDL simulations. The best ReRAM based hybrid instruction memory organization that utilizes our proposed methodology showed significantly lower energy consumption (up-to 82.07 % read energy reduction) even in case of 0 % performance penalty.

SCALLA

Today’s one-pass analytics applications tend to be data-intensive in nature and require the ability to process high volumes of data efficiently. MapReduce is a popular programming model for processing large datasets using a cluster of machines. However, the traditional MapReduce model is not well-suited for one-pass analytics, since it is geared towards batch processing and requires the dataset to be fully loaded into the cluster before running analytical queries. This article examines, from a systems standpoint, what architectural design changes are necessary to bring the benefits of the MapReduce model to incremental one-pass analytics. Our empirical and theoretical analyses of Hadoop-based MapReduce systems show that the widely used sort-merge implementation for partitioning and parallel processing poses a fundamental barrier to incremental one-pass analytics, despite various optimizations. To address these limitations, we propose a new data analysis platform that employs hash techniques to enable fast in-memory processing, and a new frequent key based technique to extend such processing to workloads that require a large key-state space. Evaluation of our Hadoop-based prototype using real-world workloads shows that our new platform significantly improves the progress of map tasks, allows the reduce progress to keep up with the map progress, with up to 3 orders of magnitude reduction of internal data spills, and enables results to be returned continuously during the job.

Assessing practical usefulness and performance of the PREDIQT method: An industrial case study

ContextWhen adapting a system to new usage patterns, processes or technologies, it is necessary to foresee the implications of the architectural design changes on system quality. Examination of quality outcomes through implementation of the different architectural design alternatives is often unfeasible. We have developed a method called PREDIQT with the aim to facilitate model-based prediction of impacts of architectural design changes on system quality. A recent case study indicated feasibility of the PREDIQT method when applied on a real-life industrial system. The promising results encouraged further and more structured evaluation of PREDIQT. ObjectiveThis paper reports on the experiences from applying the PREDIQT method in a second and more recent case study – on a real-life industrial system from another domain and with different system characteristics, as compared to the previous case study. The objective was to evaluate the method in a fully realistic setting and with respect to carefully defined criteria. MethodThe case study conducted the first two phases of PREDIQT in their entirety, while the last (third) phase was partially covered. In addition, the method was assessed through a thought experiment-based evaluation of predictions and a postmortem review. All prediction models were developed during the analysis and the entire target system was analyzed in a fully realistic setting. ResultsThe evaluation argues that the prediction models are sufficiently expressive and comprehensible. It is furthermore argued that PREDIQT: facilitates predictions such that informed decisions can be made; is cost-effective; and facilitates knowledge management. ConclusionThe experiences and results obtained indicate that the PREDIQT method can be carried out with limited resources, on a real-life system, and result in useful predictions. Furthermore, the observations indicate that the method, particularly its process, facilitates understanding of the system architecture and its quality characteristics, and contributes to structured knowledge management.

Weathering of soapstone in a historical perspective

Soapstone is a main material used in Norwegian medieval stone architecture. It is a metamorphic, dense and durable stone, but like other stones, it is occasionally subject to severe weathering. This paper gives an overview of the core issues related to outdoor soapstone weathering in Norway and shows how the weathering has changed over time. First, objects that evidently weathered quite strongly during the Little Ice Age (14th–19th century), especially in the countryside, have now been relatively stable for a hundred years or more. Although a multitude of weathering processes might have been active, this could point to a higher frequency of damaging frost events in the Little Ice Age than at present. In the case of former ruins, the present stable condition might also be related to good roofing and less moisture in the masonry. Second, the weathering was in complex ways, often governed by changes in architectural design, influenced by air pollution in the cities from the late 19th century until the recent drastic reductions in SO 2 emissions. Third, alkaline salts from Portland cement, sulfate from air pollution and some stones, as well as chloride from acid cleaning, greatly enhanced the salt load at many monuments in the 19th and 20th centuries, giving rise to severe weathering, especially at places where water leaks and damaging run-off have prevailed. This situation obviously continues to be problematic.

History of architectural acoustics and noise control in Hawaii

This paper traces the history of architectural acoustics and noise control from ancient to modern Hawaii. It begins with Hawaiian folklores on noise and concludes with suggestions on future studies on natural ventilation system with high noise transmission loss, building design and community planning for noise control. Between these limits, the paper describes an indoctrination program which eventually led the City and County of Honolulu Building Superintendent to require architects to include acoustic and noise control measures in their design of public schools and municipal buildings. Some of the changes in architectural design which followed are described. The paper also considers laws and ordinances regulating noise at the state and municipal levels, and related problems involving enforcement and conviction in the court.