Partitioning of space as basis for data structures to describe digital building models

It is state of the art to describe the geometry of buildings in digital models. Standards, for instance Industry Foundation Classes IFC, offer possibilities. However, at present time only two concepts are supported in an... [ view full abstract ]

It is state of the art to describe the geometry of buildings in digital models. Standards, for instance Industry Foundation Classes IFC, offer possibilities. However, at present time only two concepts are supported in an efficient way: boundary representations and constructive solid geometry descriptions. In literature, a third way based on the partitioning of space is described, e.g. by Mäntylä 1988. The basic idea is that each point belongs to a building object, a building component or a room, or it belongs to the exterior of a building. Models based on partitioning of space have the advantage that the topology is explicitly part of the description. Additional data structures, which are for instance part of IFC to describe topological neighboring relations, are obsolete. Models based on space partitioning answer the three relevant geometrical and topological questions explicitly: the existence of clashes, the existence of voids which are spaces where no object has been modeled, and the existence of neighboring relationships.

Digital models which are based on partitioning of space are already available. For instance, the Open Geospatial Consortium published IndoorGML 2016. The field of application is indoor navigation. However, the use of such models has not been investigated in detail for building models. Data structures, for instance the dual half edge, have already been investigated, for instance by Bougoslawski 2011. However, the field of application was the description of the surface of the interior of a building. Building components and their interconnections have not been in the main focus of the investigations. Of course, data structures such as the dual half edge are suitable for modeling; but they are difficult to understand. Operators are complicated. The question is whether other data structures can be developed based on space partitioning which are simple to handle and which answer the three above mentioned relevant questions of geometry and topology.

This paper presents data structures for digital building models that try to fulfill two requirements. The first requirement is a suitable description of the building based on a partitioning of space where clashes, voids and neighboring relations are given explicitly. The second requirement is that this description is understandable for specialists in the field of architecture and civil engineering and that this description has a special focus on the application in architecture and civil engineering. Examples are given which illustrate the power of the presented approach.

Mäntylä 1988: Mäntylä, M.: An Introduction to Solid Modeling, Computer Science Press, 1988.

Open Geospatial Consortium IndoorGML 2016: OGC IndoorGML – with Corrigendum, http://docs.opengeospatial.org/is/14-005r3/14-005r3.html, 2016, last visited 14.09.2017. 

Bougoslawski 2011: Pawel Bougoslawski: MODELLING AND ANALYSING 3D BUILDING INTERIORS WITH THE DUAL HALF-EDGE DATA STRUCTURE, PhD thesis, University of Glamorgan/Prifysgol Morgannwg, 2011.