Architecture
IFC defines an EXPRESS based entity-relationship model consisting of several hundred entities organized into an object-based inheritance hierarchy. Examples of entities include building elements such as IfcWall, geometry such as IfcExtrudedAreaSolid, and basic constructs such as IfcCartesianPoint.
At the most abstract level, IFC divides all entities into rooted and non-rooted entities. Rooted entities derive from IfcRoot and have a concept of identity (having a GUID), along with attributes for name, description, and revision control. Non-rooted entities do not have identity and instances only exist if referenced from a rooted instance directly or indirectly. IfcRoot is subdivided into three abstract concepts: object definitions, relationships, and property sets:
- IfcObjectDefinition captures tangible object occurrences and types
- IfcRelationship captures relationships among objects
- IfcPropertyDefinition captures dynamically extensible properties about objects
Read more about this topic: Industry Foundation Classes
Famous quotes containing the word architecture:
“I don’t think of form as a kind of architecture. The architecture is the result of the forming. It is the kinesthetic and visual sense of position and wholeness that puts the thing into the realm of art.”
—Roy Lichtenstein (b. 1923)
“And when his hours are numbered, and the world
Is all his own, retiring, as he were not,
Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art
To mimic in slow structures, stone by stone,
Built in an age, the mad wind’s night-work,
The frolic architecture of the snow.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Art is a jealous mistress, and, if a man have a genius for painting, poetry, music, architecture or philosophy, he makes a bad husband and an ill provider.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)