Refurbishment of building services engineering systems under a collaborative design environment

In this paper hypermedia is suggested as a suitable paradigm to represent the design processes associated with a shopping center refurbishment project. In addition, by adopting a collaborative design model, the paper makes reference to such factors as synchronous vs. asynchronous and active vs. passive modeling. Concepts in complex problem solving are also explored such as the soft system methodology as well as the application of agent-based decision support systems. Identification of primary information elements and analysis of the relations between these elements indicates that the flow of design information may be readily represented in hypermedia which features nonlinear characteristics in organizing information. The justification of developing a hypermedia tool to cope with changing conditions of a complex design problem instead of providing a solution for a predetermined problem is also argued. The paper illustrates the complex nature of collaborative design process with reference to a case study associated with the building services systems design for a Hong Kong Housing Authority refurbishment project.