I’ve been thinking about patterns for green building, and wondering why there aren’t more sites that collect and index these kinds of patterns as examples for interested architects and engineers.

Today I came across a site that does something like this:

http://architypes.net/pattern/design-process

However, unlike the OpenPV site I blogged about earlier, this one doesn’t provide any actionable data. It would be pretty cool if each pattern also offered things like: models built in SketchUp, energy analysis in graphic or raw format via EnergyPlus runs with OpenStudio (a SketchUp plugin), sensor data from a building that tried to use this pattern, etc.

Coming from the programming world, when I hear “patterns” I immediately look for data and tools and not just narrative and pictures. A coder that stumbles across some patterns descriptions (like at this site for ActionScript 3.0 patterns) usually thinks “Ok…now where are some examples I can download and try!” Narrative isn’t enough.

I wonder if architects and engineers feel the same way about resources such as these. They’re great, but they need to provide more actionable raw data for today’s design tools.

For those of you also struggling with how to load modules into AIR, a few links

http://www.mail-archive.com/flexcoders@yahoogroups.com/msg127375.html

http://blog.esofthead.com/loading-modules-in-air-application-2/

The OpenPV Project is an effort by The National Renewable Energy Lab (NREL) in Golden, CO to collect and present data on solar-power installations across the country.

I was browsing the site today when I came across their OpenPV Visualization flex app, an interesting way of browsing solar power installations. It collects the data the OpenPV project has compiled and lays it out in a google-map-plus-flex-dashboard mashup.

The app uses Flex Charting to good effect…I was never really big on the animated transitions offered by the graphs, but this application shows that they can be used to add visual interest without taking away from the basic task of reading some numbers to figure out what’s going on. Clicking from one zip code to another gives just enough animation to show you’ve changed data sets.

It’s great to see a these kinds of well-defined, well-designed repositories of open information in the alternative energy industry. I wonder if anybody is doing something similar for Green Buildings and the data they produce?

I often say that it’s a shame that the green building architecture and engineering industries don’t benefit from the open source mindset that’s improved the lives of so many computer programmers. Is it crazy to think that the kind of success and impact that Ruby on Rails has had could have an analog in the green building world? What would a 37Signals building look like — both in construction and in the final product?

Perhaps projects like OpenPV are the initial stalls in the newly forming bazaar around the architecture cathedral.

…everything has been mapped out clearly:  http://tinyurl.com/y9nlcgu

If you’re like me, you’ve been working your way slowly from the client side of things towards the server. You create your Flex apps confidently and you want that same confidence and productivity when creating the application and data layers on the server.

Problem is, there’s no language/tool combination on the server that will make you feel the same cohesiveness when developing in AS3.0/Flex on the client. Ruby on Rails + RubyAMF is nice, but not seamless. LCDS is powerful but expensive….ok there’s BlazeDS but now we’re still talking Java and stuff like Spring and Hibernate. ColdFusion 9 seems powerful but now we’re talking programming in tags, right?

I’m trying to sort out all the different benefits, drawbacks, dependencies and requirements of these different solutions (and then somebody comes along and goes, “yeah, but you know Scala and Lift are where it’s going to be at” to which I responded “uhhhh…must learn more.”)

Anyways, this post really is just a note to myself to remember that  Greg Wilson posted a bunch of links he amassed after doing a CF9 brain saturation.

And, following that, a helpful post by Holly Schinsky on data services and endpoints explained.