This factor is already a proven obstacle, as evidenced by the ongoing call from second-tier and third party players for dominant CAD vendors to revert to an open-source or standardized drawing format to facilitate portability with their own applications. There is no reason for these dominant vendors to willingly forfeit the exclusivity and superiority of their own products merely so their erstwhile customers can have the convenience of transfusing their project data into a competitor's database!

Accountability could also become an issue. Once project files become portable, users may no longer be able to hold individual vendors accountable for the integrity of their project data—an important factor that affects owner/operators, engineers, contractors, and vendors alike when attempting to prevent and recover corrupt files.

The question was also raised as to whether in the interim owners should insist on contractual language enforcing the use of standards. The first response to this suggestion was "which standards?" Engineers will use their own by default. Owner/project standards? The development of project-specific standards and the difficulty of working with them when years of experience strongly favor a well-developed set of proprietary design standards can represent a massive and unnecessary investment of time and resources. Yet some owners will insist upon obsolete or otherwise ill-advised project standards that force project teams to deal with unfamiliar demands, and subsequently cause project costs to spiral. There is indeed a huge difference between the potential efficiencies represented by arbitrary standards and those of industry standards.

It might be unrealistic to expect the "indispensable" unilateral cooperation required for the development and subsequent adoption of industry standards. Lack of initiative or even resistance can be expected from experienced architects, engineers, system vendors and cost-conscious owners when it comes to making the investments required. Even in the face of established industry standards and the promise of efficient data management over the long-term, vendors will likely wait for demand to take root before altering or opening up their own systems. Furthermore, many owners will continue to maintain existing systems and in-house standards, if not simply to avoid massive investments in wholesale system upgrades, retraining of personnel and the associated costs and risks of porting legacy project data. With vendors and users each waiting for the other to lay the groundwork, it may take some time before would-be "industry standards" get a chance to fulfill their potential.

Francisco Domingo is an architecture critic, mining consultant and engineering technology journalist living in Mulligan's Valley, Colorado and Pacific Grove, California. His work has appeared in numerous magazines and trade publications.

David Clendenen is the Editor of AECVision and Managing Editor of AECCafe.com

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