I had the privilege of moderating a panel of CIOs at ENR's FutureTech Conference in mid-December, held in San Francisco. For those of you unfamiliar with conference, it is a key gathering of technology leaders, expert technology users, and others looking to learn and share knowledge about leveraging technology in AEC firms. The panel is an open dialogue with CIOs on their challenges—keeping the lights on, satisfying internal users, and testing new technologies and practices, to name just a few issues. Here are some of the insights that the panelists shared.BIM Successes and Challenges BIM maturity is always a hot topic at

AP/Wideworld A pickup truck driver who was texting caused a deadly pileup last year near a highway work zone in Gray Summit, Mo. Fluor-Lane LLC The Capital Beltway initiative along I-495 encourages drivers to hang up their phones when in the construction zone. Related Links: Read NTSB's Recommendations Interactive Map of State Laws Construction firms are getting behind this month's sweeping recommendation from the National Transportation Safety Board that calls for a nationwide ban on phoning and texting while driving."From a work-zone perspective, we would be 100% supportive," says Brian Deery, who heads the Associated General Contractors' highway and transportation

The U.S. State Dept.'s Bureau of Overseas Buildings Operations is rolling out a five-year strategic plan for information technology to support posts around the world and the agency's Washington, D.C., headquarters.Announced at a conference in Washington, D.C., on Dec. 7, the plan's key goals include the development of a global unified building management system as well as a comprehensive building-information-modeling solution for life-cycle building planning and operations.Danilo Stapulo, chief of OBO's information resource management application development branch, says that when his office recently analyzed OBO's strengths and weaknesses, the need for interoperability "kept popping up."OBO managers were "spending altogether too

Image: ENR N/A Two years after a Hill International Inc. employee left the Marlton, N.J., firm, the IT department is still trying to retrieve data from his mobile phone. Why? Although the data belongs to the company, the device belongs to the employee.That conundrum is exactly what's keeping a lot of construction companies from adopting bring-your-own-device (BYOD) policies."Whose data is it, really?" asks Shawn Pressley, vice president of project management systems at Hill. "If [the employee] paid for the [phone service], they could call it his data. We might not have the permissions to wipe it off our contacts. The

The Construction Users Roundtable (CURT) Young Professionals 2011 survey polled Construction Industry Owners, Contractors, Designers, and Users on the topics of Technology and Professional Development. A snapshot of these survey results are discussed below.Moore’s Law describes, in general, the effect by which our technological capacity doubles every two years.  We asked, what is the most important technology tool in your company?  The results:• 23% Email• 22% Database Software such as Microsoft Excel or Access• 18% CM or Scheduling Software• 16% BIM/ CAD• 12% Other (miscellaneous)• 7% Smart Phones• 2% Tablet Devices such as iPadAcross all age groups, Email and Excel

The toolbox to support building information modeling and field data management by cloud computing is getting better stocked with new app releases and, announced on Nov. 30, the planned acquisition of cloud-computing firm Horizontal Systems by Autodesk Inc.For example, Bentley Systems Inc. also released a new app, Structural Synchronizer V8i, for iPads and iPhones—with Android and Windows versions to come. It provides data synchronization, change management, revision history and model viewing, says Huw Roberts, Bentley's global marketing director for building.The latest jockeying by design software vendors Autodesk and Bentley points to the quickening pace of innovation in software to marry

COURTESY OF BURNS & MCDONNELL COURTESY OF BURNS & MCDONNELL Layers of project and customer data flow via Google Earth to give field crews ground specs. As the federal government launches a top-down initiative to fast-track power transmission projects nationwide, Kansas City, Mo.-based Burns & McDonnell is applying a bottoms-up approach to streamline its line projects with layered GIS data.The company is using its OneTouch PM system to mobilize modules—including real estate, customer relations and construction status data—on Google Earth maps. It lets everyone on the project navigate to real-time project status information.The company is using the system on 26

Going live on Nov. 22, the U.S. Green Building Council's new App Lab features an initial eight computer applications that aim to support the green building movement.USGBC's third-party LEED automation partners developed and contributed each application in this new searchable database.Making the application mobile is a sensible course to follow, says one of the partners. "As the need becomes more mobile, so will our product," predicts Dave Weinerth, executive vice president of business development at SCIenergy, San Francisco. Other automation partners agree, although only one app is currently available in Apple's App Store.The council says the potential number of apps

There often is a disconnect between the problems researchers tackle and those that society most urgently needs to solve.Researchers seek out interesting problems to work on, and the nature of research is such that it is easy for them to be lured into problems that call for complex, mathematical solutions that, while interesting, may have little actual benefit to the world.Three years ago while I was looking to find interesting and socially important problems to address through my own research in civil engineering, I came upon a report published in 2008 by the National Academy of Engineering on the engineering

With a boatload of announcements about acquisitions, new products, agreements and promises delivered over several days beginning on Nov. 7, the provider of a suit of software and services widely used for infrastructure design, construction and management unveiled a raft of moves that, taken together, help define its technology strategy, especially with respect to 3D information model files and point clouds.During the three-day conference, users from many disciplines and sectors that employ Bentley Systems software reacted with approval as the announcements rolled out at the company's annual "Be Inspired: Thought Leadership in Infrastructure" conference, held in Amsterdam."We are at the