PR[i]M - An intelligent product manager for BlenderBIM

Hey everyone,

I have been working on an add-on that works in conjunction with BlenderBIM as part of my master’s degree project at RWTH-Aachen university. While my background is in architecture, during this project I started coding with Python and exploring the IFC schema and all aspects around it.

Briefly: “PR[i]M is a prototype system in development that makes use of IFC BIM data and unified online product databases. PR[i]M intelligently pairs up your BIM project elements with real products and allows you to generate order catalogues instantly.”

More detailed info on the add-on, what it does (and should do), as well as a demonstration are contained in the linked video. The video was made for my final presentation for the Chair for “Design Computation” under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Jakob Beetz.
Feedback and suggestions are welcome. :)

AceMoultcvillagrasaCadGiruNigelGorgioustlangCyrilCoenengfernandoand 5 others.

Comments

  • This is excellent work! Do you have social media? It would be great to share this online and inspire others. I'll also be sharing it within my company to see if we can do anything similar.

    I'm curious whether or not you also store the nominated manufacturers as IfcActor, as well as the procurement information as properties / relationships that are compliant with either COBie or the upcoming successor to COBie? This would be great for linking things like suppliers, warrantors, model numbers, and so on.

    konstakon
  • Hey Dion, thanks so much! I currently mainly use my LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/konstakon/) and YouTube channel (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClcHDMy6IkADpIH6cL74jpw). Feel free to link the video wherever you see fit, I would love if it would reach more people. The last minute of the video especially is kind of a "love letter" to the OSArch community and open-source in general, not just about the add-on.
    You obviously have some great perspectives I haven't explored yet about how to bring things together. I tried to keep things as simple as possible since this was my first project of this scope and some elements were worked on towards the final stages. The add-on is mostly using its own logic and borrows from BlenderBIM whenever needed. It would be really interesting to have a talk on how to better integrate it and possibly future proof it. :)

    Moult
  • Thank you so much Dion! I'm truly honored. And thank you again for your invaluable contributions to the open-source community. Cheers!

    MoultAce
  • edited August 2022

    Hi @konstakon, I saw in your video that you refer to a smart views panel. Where can I find that?

  • Hey @tobenz , the smart views panel was originally a concept I worked on early in my master project. It was inspired mainly by a system in BIMcollab ZOOM. With this you would be able to create smart views through BlenderBIM, save the profiles to a local library and apply/clear them at will. A menu would be available so you can decide visibility and colors based on IFC class and other elements.
    Unfortunately I didn't move forward with this since we agreed with my supervisor to start development on PR[i]M. I took some code and ideas from that initial concept and used it there.
    I think though a smart views system would be really handy as part of BlenderBIM.

  • Hey @konstakon,
    Can you share the fragments you already finished? Someone might take over maybe.

  • @konstakon have you seen the selection filters work that @vpajic has done? I think it is similar to smart views, where you can save queries to an IfcGroup. It would be sweet if it had more features like colour coding and I think sharing your work will definitely be able to feed some inspiration into this feature :)

    konstakon
  • This is really cool and the youtube clip is very well made, cool marketing. :-D
    Reminds me a bit of the Bimforce add-in for Revit.

    IFC and based op BlenderBIM, which is more interesting for manafacturers/suppliers for reasons we all know on this forum. :-) if this prototype could mature. Then the use of BlenderBIM would be very interesting for contractors as well.

    Is the code going to be somewhere and well documented?

    konstakon
  • Hey @tobenz , I'll look into it. Although this was mostly about presenting the concept and workflow. Code is nothing special and mainly borrows from BlenderBIM operators if I remember correctly.
    @Moult Maybe even presenting the concept and how it could work would be a start, maybe someone will be motivated to develop it. I will look into the work of @vpajic , sounds very interesting.
    Thanks @Coen for the nice remarks. :) I will try to clean up the code and write better comments. I hope to get things in order at some point and upload it.

    vpajicMoult
  • Hey @konstakon and others, I'm on holidays until next week, but i plan on enhancing this further, maybe we can brainstorm together? ☺️

    tobenzMoultkonstakonDavidE
  • I'm still relatively new to everything IFC and python, please keep that in mind, but I'd love to brainstorm and also see how you guys work. It will be really interesting! :) @vpajic @Moult @tobenz

  • Would love a combined selection/visibility filter that worked like the tag/limit command in mutt

    konstakon
  • edited November 2022

    This project is very interesting: one of the strengths of other software is precisely the ability to load libraries of products.
    As an additional ideas, it would be useful to be able to filter, in addition to the product point of view, from the manufacturer's point of view. For example being able to prefer a geographical location (for a question of sustainability, logistic, price/exchange, taxation and vat) over the project: French manufacturers if the project is in France and Mexican manufacturers if the project is in Mexico.
    Or simply being able to further filter by knowing the name of the desired manufacturer, useful when you have a huge list :)

    Thank you!
    Riccardo

    konstakon
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