6 Emergence and convergence of knowledge in building production: Knowledge-based design and digital manufacturing
Advances in computation, both regarding its treatment and technology, have stimulated the design and implementation of an ever-growing number of computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) applications. Application elaboration both responds to and generates new conceptualisations of architectural knowledge, in a body of principles, rules and regulations which commands the building’s design and its realisation, therefore it constitutes a preliminary datum for its comprehension, and thereby is of theoretical importance (Lyon 2006). Until recently, the use of CAD systems1 in building production was limited to drafting systems. The introduction of solid modelling and recently the development of parametric three-dimensional modelling are providing a new platform for embedding design and fabrication knowledge. Despite the continuous increase of power in computers and systems capacities, the creative space of freedom defined by them acting as cognitive instruments remains almost unexplored. Therefore, I propose a change from a design knowledge based on objects to one focused on design as a cognitively distributed process.
Design is a cognitive process that consists of the consensual production of meaningful artifacts through a knowledge capture, generation, manipulation, synthesis and communication process (Lyon 2005). Designers investigate ...
