Attached Scientific Computers in Structural Analysis
The design and analysis process is explored in terms of its requirements for user decision-making and interaction. This is presented as a three-phase procedure: (1) the engineer developing...
Reflections on the Impact of Computer Science on Engineering
Over the past several decades, the use of computers in engineering has grown significantly. Over this same time period, work in the relatively new discipline of Computer Science has impacted...
Water and Wastewater, Time to Automate?
Water and wastewater engineers have been slow to adopt a full circle systems approach to automated monitoring and control. Such a technical tactic for controlling water and wastewater...
Construction Company Builds a Computer System
The case history of the computerization of a construction company is presented. The report reviews the stages that the company went through from manual operations for bookkeeping, estimating,...
Evaluation of Safety Alternatives by Benefit/Cost Analysis
There is an increasing awareness of the need to use limited highway safety funds on projects that offer the greatest benefits. This paper describes the development and application of a...
Selection of Performance Levels for Longitudinal Barriers
There is a demand within the highway community for multi-service level safety features, including traffic barriers. The need has become more acute in recent years as revenues decline and...
Failure Classifications
A detailed description of the failure classification with respect to the constructed facilities is presented. Author is of the opinion that most reports of failure even of an extensive...
Data Collection and Information Dissemination: Current Efforts and Challenges
The need for the civil engineering community to collect and disseminate information on failures has been discussed widely. It appears that in recent years our profession's reluctance to...
Mechanics of Crack Propagation in Stiff Clays
Many stiff clays forming part of natural slopes and earth dams exist in the fissured state. When these cracks are subjected to gravity induced normal and shear stresses they may propagate....
Lateral Pressure in a Stiff Clay
A series of consolidated undrained and drained triaxial tests and oedometer tests were performed on horizontal and vertical specimens taken from an overconsolidated cretaceous clay. An...
Systems Model for Water Supply Following Earthquakes
The water supply for San Francisco is described with emphasis on the city's auxiliary water distribution network, which provides fire protection for the most heavily built-up...
What is an Expert System
Knowledge-based expert systems (KBES) have created much excitement in the civil engineering computer user community. KBES evoke expectations of full-blown Artificial Intelligence (AI)...
Problem Solving Using Expert System Techniques
There are basically two approaches to problem solving currently used in expert systems: the derivation approach and the formation approach. The derivation approach involves deriving a...
Expert System Tools for Civil Engineering Applications
Expert system software tools have played a major role in expediting program development. Some problems should not and possibly cannot be solved by current expert system technology. For...
Attributes and Characteristics of Expert Systems
This paper discusses some of the characteristics of expert systems, with emphasis on the incorporation of these attributes in the development stage. It is suggested that the scope of expert...
Expert Systems in an Engineering-Construction Firm
Although it has been generally accepted that the field of engineering provides a wide variety of potential applications for expert systems, most developments have been academic in nature....
Howsafe: A Microcomputer-Based Expert System to Evaluate the Safety of a Construction Firm
This paper discusses the development of the Howsafe expert system as a case history in knowledge engineering on microcomputers. The focus is on issues of knowledge representation, reasoning...
An Expert System for Construction Schedule Analysis
This paper describes a prototypical expert system for the analysis and evaluation of construction scheduling networks from an owners' perspective. The knowledge base, which...
Application of Expert Systems to Construction Management Decision-Making and Risk Analysis
Application of expert systems in the area of construction management decision-making and risk analysis are explored. Decision-making under uncertainty is one of the attributes of human...
Design of an Expert System for the Rating of Highway Bridges
A microcomputer-based expert system used to determine the effects of vehicles and overloaded vehicles on simple span bridges with reinforced concrete deck and prestressed concrete I-beams...
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