+ Image Source: Compiled by Domo, a Software-as-Service Provider Esther D'Amico is a senior editor at ENR and editor of ENR New York where she covers news and issues affecting the industry in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut.As the data-center market continues to grow at what experts say is an above-average rate, two trends are emerging that likely will keep AEC contractors that specialize in this sector busy.At one end of the spectrum, some large non-tech enterprises are selling their data centers and opting for outsourcing, as opposed to building, operating and owning the physical facilities. At the other

As mobile technology floods jobsites across the world, contractors are swamped with choices among proprietary applications for their fleets of smartphones and tablets.

Related Links: NY Tech Meetup FieldLens I am not sure when a meetup becomes an institution, but a 10-year-old  monthly gathering of tech heads in New York City called NY Tech Meetup has definitely crossed the bar. It has more than 40,000 members and claims to be the largest tech meetup group in the world.Every session I have attended has had more attendees than the previous one, although the format remains the same; three batches of three presenters describing their breakout tech inventions and then answering questions from the audience, plus one bonus presentation to mix things up.The audiences are

Related Links: BuildingReports A new service leverages quick-response (QR) code technology to give workers instant access to historical compliance data for a facility's building systems."We saw a need to eliminate the paperwork still associated with life-safety work in a facility," says Jason Kronz, president and chief technology officer for Building- Reports, Atlanta, the building safety-compliance firm that developed the QR service LiveArchive.When used with a mobile device such as an iPhone or Android, LiveArchive allows inspectors, managers, owners and emergency responders to scan a QR code to access an equipment report for up-to-date, historical data on fire, life-safety, security and

Photo Courtesy of kcstreetcar.org In Kansas City, streetcar project teams are using PDF collaboration software by Bluebeam and mobile devices to coordinate relocation of utilities' systems. Related Links: iPads and Tech Support: Time Saved Vs. Time Spent Bluebeam, Citrix Tie-Up Extends Desktop Power to Tablet Apps It has been only a couple of years since Kansas Dept. of Transportation (KDOT) engineers began using online storage for plans and project files. Washington state DOT just last year launched a website that publicly displays its projects' status and data. Until recently, the Iowa Dept. of Transportation did not have tools such as

Related Links: Roxbury Landfill Greenlight Portal At Fenimore Landfill in Roxbury, N.J., where rotting debris is blamed for the release of dangerous amounts of hydrogen sulfide, real-time monitoring is providing a warning system for nearby residents should the releases spike, as well as valuable data to those evaluating solutions.Emilcott Technology Inc. has developed a system of real-time air monitoring, called Greenlight, which integrates cloud computing to make the data publicly available online instantly. It is currently deployed at the Fenimore Landfill.Bruce Groves, president of Emilcott, says the monitoring system is the first of it’s kind.“It’s really the future of detection,”

Related Links: Box Inc's Full Report A new report from a cloud service provider illustrates how the construction industry communicates.“We thought the software industry would be highest in terms of mobility, but we were floored when we saw the trends of construction,” says Stephanie Hagio, a strategic project lead at Box Inc., Los Altos, Calif., a cloud content-management service.Construction proved to be both the most mobile and the most externally collaborative of the five industries included in the study: software, media and entertainment, manufacturing, financial services and construction. Measuring communication data from 300 of its customers, Box monitored data-sharing devices,

Related Links: 3D RFIs, Collaboration With BlueBeam's Latest Revu 10 Contractors Go High-Tech for Daytona Racetrack Rebuild PDF mark-up tool maker Bluebeam and virtualization software provider Citrix are on a mission to reduce the amount of paper that is often chased on major projects. Their latest partnership could do more of that and help users collaborate across different platforms with more ease.The companies say they have integrated Citrix's ShareFile cloud storage service with Bluebeam's Revu iPad app. It works like this: After files are synced with Revu for the iPad, ShareFile users work on project PDFs using Revu's Bluebeam Studio,

PHOTO Courtesy of Michigan State University Nizar Lajnef installs a battery-less, vibration-powered sensor to record asphalt cracking, creating a data time line of its breakdown. Related Links: How Sensors on I-10 Twin Span Bridge Reduce Unknowns Bridge Owners Toolbox: Sensors, Gauges, Radars, Models Researchers are testing novel infrastructure-monitoring sensors on roads. The new sensors are powered by passing vehicles.The test could address a major flaw in sensors that are embedded to monitor degradation of infrastructure: They lose power, says Nizar Lajnef, assistant professor of civil and environment engineering at Michigan State University."Battery-powered sensors last only two to three years, max,"

Related Links: ZweigWhite survey Detailed survey reports about the use of information technology in the industry provide insight into the real world experiences and plans of practitioners, so the release of results of an annual survey that has been analyzing it for 16 years is worthy of attention. ZweigWhite, a Fayetteville, Ark.-based business management resource for designers and planners, recently released its 2014 Information Technology Survey of Architecture, Engineering, Planning & Environmental Consulting Firms. It provides a granular, representative sampling of IT use at such firms, as well as a forecast. The annual reports are used by many firms for