On Wednesday and today (Thursday), me and margaret have been in the labs all day, from 8.30 til at least 6-7pm working on the model. Alot of things needed to be altered and fixed, and we had to keep importing the 3dsmax model into ut3 continuously, making sure it accepts everything. The materials and the tiling, the normals (ohhhh the bloody normals), and the fact that the model is one element is what we were dealing with. Being able to see each face, which there is probably 60 on each surface or solid!, is extra difficult because it's not possible to hide some of the elements to be able to see behind it. You could imagine...
But finally, by 7.15 2day, we figured out how to save the ut3 file without it losing the package, we have a model pretty much completed (another early morning for us to finish it off by midday 2morrow hopefully), materials of the furniture are completed, lighting is being tackled by priscilla, terrain by danielle, which is progressing really well, and sounds just about given to us by susanne before she leaves for paris.
Things are going ok, but... we only have 4 more full days! We will be alright i guess :)
Just a few days of sleepless nights and a litre of coffee will do it! Its all about discipline! and team work, especially now!
We will have friday, saturday, monday and tuesday to complete it! A very busy week indeed!
Thursday, June 12, 2008
CONFLICT
Team decision-making integrates more information and resources; there are advantages of multiple input. However, decision making in teams is not always pleasant. Team decision-making causes conflict. But surprisingly it may have a negative or a positive outcomes. The conflict can influence a great solution and decision, or it can cause failure for the team. ‘Thus conflict is a pivotal variable in team decision-making process’ (Lang, 2008)
Conflict is common, natural, and inevitable. People have different opinions, different interests especially on the one idea, and different understandings and knowledge. Management of negative conflict issues should be already organised before a conflict can arise in a workplace. Knowing the methods of solving a problem is a great way of being prepared to work out the best outcomes for both parties.
In our group, there is much conflict, we do not always decide on the same thing. This can always be a problem because working as a team; the people need to be aiming for a common goal with the same steps in mind. Therefore when conflict arises there needs to be compromise, and the interests of the task need to be the priority…always.
Conflict in terms of employee and employer disagreements is an important factor as we enter into the workplace. Decisions and conflicting ideas on wages, certain tasks to be completed, the success of these tasks and job satisfaction are a major impact on our employments. Dealing with conflict should be done maturely and in a procedural manner.
In business, there are certain factors involved in employment relations. Making sure that the human resource cycle is flowing properly, Acquisition, Development, Maintenance and Separation are done properly.
Acquisition involves recruitment and selection; making sure the employee is being trained and acquiring skill and knowledge is Development; monetary and non-monetary rewards and performance appraisal is Maintenance and redundancy, retrenchment and dismissal are forms of separation. All these aspects have a potential for conflict, such as an employee not being satisfied with a job, or the wages he has been receiving, or the treatment he has been having at work, or the dismissal was unfair or the redundancy or retrenchment packages are not met or satisfactory. These matters are serious and needing to be consulted.
There are rights and responsibilities clearly stated in contracts and legislation. Contracts are important for mutual decision-making before anything legal occurs; there are employee and employer rights and responsibilities known in the business world, and legislation such as the Workplace Relations Act, Equal employment opportunity and anti-discrimination laws and occupational health and safety laws to help when conflict arises.
From
D. Sykes, V. Hansen and E. Codsi, Business Studies Preliminary, Melbourne: Addison Wesley Longman Pty Ltd, 2000
LANG Chungang, XI Youmin, GUO Shiyi, Impact of team conflict on team decision quality
and satisfaction: An empirical research in China, Front. Bus. Res. China 2008, 2(1):1–14
DOI 10.1007/s11782-008-0001-z
Ka Wai Chan & Xu Huang & Peng Man Ng, Managers’ conflict management styles and employee attitudinal outcomes: The mediating role of trust, Asia Pacific J Manage (2008) 25:277–295 DOI 10.1007/s10490-007-9037-4
Conflict is common, natural, and inevitable. People have different opinions, different interests especially on the one idea, and different understandings and knowledge. Management of negative conflict issues should be already organised before a conflict can arise in a workplace. Knowing the methods of solving a problem is a great way of being prepared to work out the best outcomes for both parties.
In our group, there is much conflict, we do not always decide on the same thing. This can always be a problem because working as a team; the people need to be aiming for a common goal with the same steps in mind. Therefore when conflict arises there needs to be compromise, and the interests of the task need to be the priority…always.
Conflict in terms of employee and employer disagreements is an important factor as we enter into the workplace. Decisions and conflicting ideas on wages, certain tasks to be completed, the success of these tasks and job satisfaction are a major impact on our employments. Dealing with conflict should be done maturely and in a procedural manner.
In business, there are certain factors involved in employment relations. Making sure that the human resource cycle is flowing properly, Acquisition, Development, Maintenance and Separation are done properly.
Acquisition involves recruitment and selection; making sure the employee is being trained and acquiring skill and knowledge is Development; monetary and non-monetary rewards and performance appraisal is Maintenance and redundancy, retrenchment and dismissal are forms of separation. All these aspects have a potential for conflict, such as an employee not being satisfied with a job, or the wages he has been receiving, or the treatment he has been having at work, or the dismissal was unfair or the redundancy or retrenchment packages are not met or satisfactory. These matters are serious and needing to be consulted.
There are rights and responsibilities clearly stated in contracts and legislation. Contracts are important for mutual decision-making before anything legal occurs; there are employee and employer rights and responsibilities known in the business world, and legislation such as the Workplace Relations Act, Equal employment opportunity and anti-discrimination laws and occupational health and safety laws to help when conflict arises.
From
D. Sykes, V. Hansen and E. Codsi, Business Studies Preliminary, Melbourne: Addison Wesley Longman Pty Ltd, 2000
LANG Chungang, XI Youmin, GUO Shiyi, Impact of team conflict on team decision quality
and satisfaction: An empirical research in China, Front. Bus. Res. China 2008, 2(1):1–14
DOI 10.1007/s11782-008-0001-z
Ka Wai Chan & Xu Huang & Peng Man Ng, Managers’ conflict management styles and employee attitudinal outcomes: The mediating role of trust, Asia Pacific J Manage (2008) 25:277–295 DOI 10.1007/s10490-007-9037-4
Notes from Lecture on Planning
Planning
There is the client, the cost planner, all of the engineers, these ones are measurable, but architecture is subjective->design
The project has a life cycle
Concept, design, tendering, pre-construction, commissioning, asset management
Hierarchy of planning- depending on the person, the task they need to complete and the time needed
The best thing about planning is solving the problems before construction
Tools to allow for planning
-Multiple Acttivity Chart (MAC)- timetables(for repetitive activities)
-GANTT chart- bar chart, one activity to the next (aligned with time)
Network Diagram
-shows the workflow (without dates) and constraints
Schedule
-shows workflow (with time, dates and resources)
Float is the time to procrastinate (float activity)
Critical path- the longest sequence o connected activities with NO float
There are so many factors that can influence the workflow (like time, weather, environment)
Contingency is stuffup time so ‘plan’ for that
You should always have a plan B
After the plan is made, use it!
You use it also to find the status of where you are and where you need to be
Look forward and look backwards
If there are problems, which there always will be, reschedule the plan to allow other activities to happen and get back to status quo
There is acceleration
-Overlapping activites
-Additional resources
There is the client, the cost planner, all of the engineers, these ones are measurable, but architecture is subjective->design
The project has a life cycle
Concept, design, tendering, pre-construction, commissioning, asset management
Hierarchy of planning- depending on the person, the task they need to complete and the time needed
The best thing about planning is solving the problems before construction
Tools to allow for planning
-Multiple Acttivity Chart (MAC)- timetables(for repetitive activities)
-GANTT chart- bar chart, one activity to the next (aligned with time)
Network Diagram
-shows the workflow (without dates) and constraints
Schedule
-shows workflow (with time, dates and resources)
Float is the time to procrastinate (float activity)
Critical path- the longest sequence o connected activities with NO float
There are so many factors that can influence the workflow (like time, weather, environment)
Contingency is stuffup time so ‘plan’ for that
You should always have a plan B
After the plan is made, use it!
You use it also to find the status of where you are and where you need to be
Look forward and look backwards
If there are problems, which there always will be, reschedule the plan to allow other activities to happen and get back to status quo
There is acceleration
-Overlapping activites
-Additional resources
Wednesday, June 11, 2008
CONTEXT
Historic, Cultural and Geographic Context
In the computing world, ‘New opportunities have engendered considerable interest in context-aware computing —computational systems that can sense and respond to aspects of the settings in which they are used.’ (1) This is an introduction to interactive technologies that adjust to certain settings and contexts.
Here we can see that context is a consideration used to adapt and respond to create something, giving reason to the decisions made in any field, not just computing.
The historic, cultural and geographic aspects affect any field, in literature, law and legislation, social sciences, architecture and this list can go on. In architecture it is definitely an important consideration when thinking about the surroundings of a building, physical and theoretical. These context considerations are used when creating something new or to analyse something old.
The historical context will affect its ‘heritage’ characteristics and explain the society at the time and their influences; the cultural aspects of the now and the present and how the building ‘fits in’ to the society and its values; and the physical surroundings and where it is situated in relation to other buildings and the environment.
As Crisman explains in his article about Architectural Styles from The Whole Building Design Guide website, she speaks of how to decide on a style for a new building and the how it relates to other aspects.
"Relating to the context" means fully understanding this existing context [“which Architectural ‘context’ refers to the immediate physical, cultural, and even economic surroundings of a building”] and developing a clear strategy for how a new building will relate to these conditions. A difficult aspect of context is that it is always changing, unless a project is situated within a protected historic district where few physical changes are permitted.(2)
Then she speaks of how the geographic context influences the building design. Every building has a geographical ‘Place’ and “must be understood at a range of scales—national, regional, local, neighborhood, block, and immediate adjacencies.” (2)
The geographical understanding of the unbuilt Silkeborg Museum; The existing Silkeborg Museum, which our part of the museum (the unbuilt one) would have been adjacent to, is situated in the town of Silkeborg, Denmark, 45 km from the city of Århus. The town of Silkeborg has many forests and gardens and the existing Museum is apparently the oldest building in town. Jorn Utzon designed the building with simple materials to not over exaggerate above the textures of the historic existing museum but used the form and shape to make his building significant and stand out.
There should be reasons for all the decisions made in creating a building or analyzing an existing one and these reasons should, within any time frame, consider the historic, cultural and geographic contexts.
(1) Paul Dourish, ‘What We Talk About When We Talk About Context’, School of Information and Computer Science, http://www.ics.uci.edu/~jpd/publications/2004/PUC2004-context.pdf
(2) Phoebe Crisman, ‘Style’, The Whole Building Design Guide, http://www.wbdg.org/resources/style.php, last updated 05-23-2008
In the computing world, ‘New opportunities have engendered considerable interest in context-aware computing —computational systems that can sense and respond to aspects of the settings in which they are used.’ (1) This is an introduction to interactive technologies that adjust to certain settings and contexts.
Here we can see that context is a consideration used to adapt and respond to create something, giving reason to the decisions made in any field, not just computing.
The historic, cultural and geographic aspects affect any field, in literature, law and legislation, social sciences, architecture and this list can go on. In architecture it is definitely an important consideration when thinking about the surroundings of a building, physical and theoretical. These context considerations are used when creating something new or to analyse something old.
The historical context will affect its ‘heritage’ characteristics and explain the society at the time and their influences; the cultural aspects of the now and the present and how the building ‘fits in’ to the society and its values; and the physical surroundings and where it is situated in relation to other buildings and the environment.
As Crisman explains in his article about Architectural Styles from The Whole Building Design Guide website, she speaks of how to decide on a style for a new building and the how it relates to other aspects.
"Relating to the context" means fully understanding this existing context [“which Architectural ‘context’ refers to the immediate physical, cultural, and even economic surroundings of a building”] and developing a clear strategy for how a new building will relate to these conditions. A difficult aspect of context is that it is always changing, unless a project is situated within a protected historic district where few physical changes are permitted.(2)
Then she speaks of how the geographic context influences the building design. Every building has a geographical ‘Place’ and “must be understood at a range of scales—national, regional, local, neighborhood, block, and immediate adjacencies.” (2)
The geographical understanding of the unbuilt Silkeborg Museum; The existing Silkeborg Museum, which our part of the museum (the unbuilt one) would have been adjacent to, is situated in the town of Silkeborg, Denmark, 45 km from the city of Århus. The town of Silkeborg has many forests and gardens and the existing Museum is apparently the oldest building in town. Jorn Utzon designed the building with simple materials to not over exaggerate above the textures of the historic existing museum but used the form and shape to make his building significant and stand out.
There should be reasons for all the decisions made in creating a building or analyzing an existing one and these reasons should, within any time frame, consider the historic, cultural and geographic contexts.
(1) Paul Dourish, ‘What We Talk About When We Talk About Context’, School of Information and Computer Science, http://www.ics.uci.edu/~jpd/publications/2004/PUC2004-context.pdf
(2) Phoebe Crisman, ‘Style’, The Whole Building Design Guide, http://www.wbdg.org/resources/style.php, last updated 05-23-2008
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
PLANNING
While searching the word ‘plan’ in Google, like every body does first off, I came across an internet page about ground plans for architects. In the essay appearing on this page, it stated that “A genuine footprint of a building on its site, the ground plan contains many of the key aspects of a project, at once a means of representation, an architect’s design tool, and a layout and instruction pattern for the builder. Though the ground plan is invisible to the inhabitant, it determines with precision the quality of the spaces we inhabit.”
This definition of a ground plan in architecture can be used to define the general idea of a plan for any project or goal, not just in our field->
Plans should ‘contain many of the key aspects of the project’; they are a ‘means of representation’ of the tasks needed to finish the project; they are a ‘design tool’ for a project, outlining its steps towards achievement; they are ‘a layout and instruction’ manual for the project at hand; and even though the plan is ‘invisible’ it still should ‘determine with precision the quality’ of the tasks and the results they may form.
In this essay it also speaks of the statement made by Le Corbusier that the plan is the generator. The author takes from this statement the idea that a plan is an abstraction that generates. ‘If understood as a generator of the architectural idea… the plan is more closely approximates its biological definition as expressed in the Spanish term for it: planta, which also translates the English word “plant”, an entity with the ability to grow.’
Therefore a plan has an ability to create something. This is a fundamental idea about planning-it forms and creates the goal required.
In our group environment, we tried as much as we could to create plans, forecasting the weekly schedules we had and assigning days and hours to finish off a certain tasks. When these tasks were not accomplished at the planned time, just like our guest lecturer stated, 'If there are problems, which there always will be, reschedule the plan to allow other activities to happen and get back to status quo'. This was our strategy most of the time.
She also spoke of Contingency which is 'stuff up' time and so she sarcastically said to 'plan' for it.
Float is time allowed for procrastinating, which we kept in mind also.
She also introduced the idea of Acceleration and how to do so:
-by Overlapping activites
-and using Additional resources
Planning Cycle and Objectives
In all sorts of businesses, there are set stages of the Planning Cycle: Situation Anaylsis, Strategic Audit, Objectives, Strategies, Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation. There are multiple variations of this but they usually include the same ideas, such as the image shown below:
There are strategic, tactical and operational Objectives (a Hierarchy of Objectives)
-Strategic Objectives- goals as a whole and supports the mission statement
-Tactical- Goals for each of the functional areas and supports the strategic objectives
-Operational- Goals for people working within each functional area and supports tactical goals
Tools
There are multiple tools to use in designing the plans and its layout.
General tools used to plan include Forecasting, Break-even Analysis, Decision Trees, and Budgets.
There are also software design tools to aid in the planning process. Here are some examples of software tools:
Plan Bee Pro with the use of the popular Gantt Chart.bmp)
This definition of a ground plan in architecture can be used to define the general idea of a plan for any project or goal, not just in our field->
Plans should ‘contain many of the key aspects of the project’; they are a ‘means of representation’ of the tasks needed to finish the project; they are a ‘design tool’ for a project, outlining its steps towards achievement; they are ‘a layout and instruction’ manual for the project at hand; and even though the plan is ‘invisible’ it still should ‘determine with precision the quality’ of the tasks and the results they may form.
In this essay it also speaks of the statement made by Le Corbusier that the plan is the generator. The author takes from this statement the idea that a plan is an abstraction that generates. ‘If understood as a generator of the architectural idea… the plan is more closely approximates its biological definition as expressed in the Spanish term for it: planta, which also translates the English word “plant”, an entity with the ability to grow.’
Therefore a plan has an ability to create something. This is a fundamental idea about planning-it forms and creates the goal required.
In our group environment, we tried as much as we could to create plans, forecasting the weekly schedules we had and assigning days and hours to finish off a certain tasks. When these tasks were not accomplished at the planned time, just like our guest lecturer stated, 'If there are problems, which there always will be, reschedule the plan to allow other activities to happen and get back to status quo'. This was our strategy most of the time.
She also spoke of Contingency which is 'stuff up' time and so she sarcastically said to 'plan' for it.
Float is time allowed for procrastinating, which we kept in mind also.
She also introduced the idea of Acceleration and how to do so:
-by Overlapping activites
-and using Additional resources
Planning Cycle and Objectives
In all sorts of businesses, there are set stages of the Planning Cycle: Situation Anaylsis, Strategic Audit, Objectives, Strategies, Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation. There are multiple variations of this but they usually include the same ideas, such as the image shown below:
There are strategic, tactical and operational Objectives (a Hierarchy of Objectives)
-Strategic Objectives- goals as a whole and supports the mission statement
-Tactical- Goals for each of the functional areas and supports the strategic objectives
-Operational- Goals for people working within each functional area and supports tactical goals
Tools
There are multiple tools to use in designing the plans and its layout.
General tools used to plan include Forecasting, Break-even Analysis, Decision Trees, and Budgets.
There are also software design tools to aid in the planning process. Here are some examples of software tools:
Plan Bee Pro with the use of the popular Gantt Chart
Rational Plan software tool with options including creating WBS and Gantt Charts, assigning resources to certain tasks, naming and listing tasks and also assigning the required duration of that task and many more 
Here are some links to multiple listings of other planning software
http://www.filebuzz.com/files/project_planning_software/1.html
http://www.dotnetthis.com/corporate/projectmanagement/
References
Fernando Pérez Oyarzun, Four observations on ground plans, ARQ, n. 58 En planta / Plan view, Santiago, December, 2004, p. 24. (http://www.scielo.cl/fbpe/html/arq/n58/body-i/art04-i.htm)
Images
Image 1
http://www.projectmanagerkit.com/images/project-lifecycle-complete.jpg
Image 2
http://www.filedudes.com/PlanBee_project_management_planning_tool-screenshot-26367.html
Image 3
http://www.filebuzz.com/software_screenshot/full/19786-RationalPlan_Project_Management_Software.jpg
Here are some links to multiple listings of other planning software
http://www.filebuzz.com/files/project_planning_software/1.html
http://www.dotnetthis.com/corporate/projectmanagement/
References
Fernando Pérez Oyarzun, Four observations on ground plans, ARQ, n. 58 En planta / Plan view, Santiago, December, 2004, p. 24. (http://www.scielo.cl/fbpe/html/arq/n58/body-i/art04-i.htm)
Images
Image 1
http://www.projectmanagerkit.com/images/project-lifecycle-complete.jpg
Image 2
http://www.filedudes.com/PlanBee_project_management_planning_tool-screenshot-26367.html
Image 3
http://www.filebuzz.com/software_screenshot/full/19786-RationalPlan_Project_Management_Software.jpg
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