software and construction

 The objective of all tunnel projects is to deliver the completed tunnel in time and in budget    within acceptable environmental impact guidelines. This requires a complex interaction    between a large number of people and between people and machines. Systems make all this    work. Good systems can lead a project to its objective whilst poor systems can hinder.    Important characteristics of all systems are their cost and capabilities, time for    implementation, available inputs and outputs, user friendliness and ease of communication.    Robust systems require built in redundancy and disaster recovery measures to account for    whatever fate throws your way. Really useful systems integrate across multi-disciplines to    bind the team together and focus resources. The paper will review human and computer    systems from various points of view and look at the options for integrating these into various    types of projects. 

1. Introduction

 One of the often ignored characteristics of construction is that in many cases each project    starts from scratch and once finally delivered loses almost all of its assets to other projects    and companies. This is unavoidable since no company can afford to keep the workforce if no    follow up project exists. As a result, systems that have evolved on one project are not always    transferred to other projects. Even when successive projects occur the same teams are    seldom involved or are not in place when systems are set up. 

2. System Characteristics

 Systems are essential parts of modern construction. They provide the communications and    the checks and balances. They introduce rigor into daily activities and control day to day risk.    If set up effectively, systems provide efficiencies which translate into time and cost savings. 

 In his 2009 Terzhagi lecture Alan Powderham stressed the importance of observational    engineering in driving both innovation and safety. All systems can be divided into    components of procedure and feedback. Procedure is the series of systematic steps required    to undertake a task and the feedback deals with the way results are reported back to enable    the procedure to be assessed and modified. Human systems work well on the procedural    level provided that sufficient training is given but fail in the feedback where they are often    limited by a number of factors:   

the speed at which information can be deliveredthe ability to provide the information in forms suitable for the various levels of the organization consistency of the data collected consistency in processing and analysis    consistency in the formatting of reports to allow end users to compare and contrast data.

 The application of standards for data and reporting can go some way to deal with the issues    of consistency but then these must be controlled adding an additional overhead to the    system. Machine based systems can provide improvement in each of these areas. 

3. Key Factors Affecting Human Systems

Even in this simple Owner – Engineer – Contractor matrix    the number of potential systems in place is large, and often in excess of a hundred systems    can co-exist. 

 At the discipline and task level, systems are largely brought to the project by individuals and    are commonly based on that individual’s experience of a particular type of construction.    Whilst this experience is valuable it may also be somewhat prejudiced to a certain set of    conditions which may not apply in the new role. Such new systems will require some effort to    initiate and maintain especially with teams unfamiliar with the methods. Often the architect of    the systems does not get the required quality of input because of this initial unfamiliarity. If    the team subsequently transfers en-masse from one job to another the system will evolve but    unfortunately this is seldom the case. 

 Consider the systems in place along each stage of a Project Delivery Cycle. In addition to the    variety introduced by the various corporate boundaries rigid contractual boundaries also    ensure that a wide variety of different systems are used at various stages of construction    projects. Very little live factual data is transferred across the contract boundaries. In most    cases deliverables are PDF reports and CAD files and the ownership of the data remains    with the party undertaking the contract. 

4. Machine Based Systems

 Table 4.1 shows a listing of the various systems which may be utilised during the lifetime of a    project. Many of these are based on IT systems but there is an array of forms and formats    used. Typically systems are initiated at the construction stage and can vary from document    management to instrumentation management systems to full data management systems. 

4.1 Instrumentation Systems

 The main driver of instrumentation systems is the sheer quantity of information which puts it    beyond the capability of conventional spreadsheet management. Real time monitoring and    alarms also require systems. 

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