• Convert models from ISO 16739 to ISO 15926
• Convert models from ISO 15926 to ISO 16739 (coming)
• Convert models between different implementations of ISO 16739 Coming)
• Mapping subsytem greatly simplifies this process - no progamming needed

The Process Industry has adopted ISO 15926 to address the interoperability issue and the deployment of this is being accelerated by FIATECH  projects. The building industry has adopted ISO/PAS 16739 (IFC) for exchange and these can be loaded from several suppliers into a common repository creating a Building Information Model (BIM). Most Capital Projects include process facilities and buildings which means that information will be delivered in both of these standards.

In the design phase there is a need for close interaction between the building and the process systems. Both types of information are needed for construction and maintenance.

Lack of interoperability between these standards can mean that major issues may not be found until construction, causing delays and major additional cost. With interoperability between the standards, the information can be regularly and easily exchanged between the people designing the plant and those designing the buildings, ensuring the referenced data is current.

For construction, operations and maintenance, information in two different formats will have to be handled. With interoperability this situation can be easily managed and a single common repository created. Thus interoperability will facilitate close working in design, reducing cost and elapsed time, and will enable mistakes that would be costly to correct in construction, to be avoided.

The development of Industry Foundation Classes (IFC) was started in 1995 with the formation of the International Alliance for Interoperability (IAI) to facilitate interoperability between the different intelligent building design systems. The IAI developed this specification and the organisation is now call buildingSMART. The IFC specification was registered as ISO / PAS 16739 in 2008.

The concept of IFC is similar to that of ISO 15926 in that the classes used are standardised but they differ in implementation. IFCs classes are implemented by the software suppliers in their products whereas for ISO 15926 the software systems maintain their own objects and map to and from  those of ISO 15926. The mapping process is seen as a major part of implementing ISO 15926 whereas there is no mapping concept in IFC.

With IFCs the base classes implemented in the systems are mostly the same and so the majority of the information can be integrated to form a BIM. However systems also use extensions to both the classes and properties of the classes and these are none standard and have to be handled on a case by case basis.

There is a separate page that discusses the mapping capabilities of XMpLant in detail but for this context simple mapping only is required. The name of the IFC Class and the names of the properties can be mapped to the classes of ISO 15926 and vice versa. The mapping is defined in an XML mapping file which can be customized depending on where the IFC file has come from or is going to.

This mapping capability can also be used to map the class or property names between IFC files created by different systems.

Mapping between ISO 15926 and ISO/PAS 16739

XMpLant maps between ISO 15926 and ISO 16739 converting the geometry from the form used in IFCs to that used by ISO 15926 and vice versa. . There is no loss of integrity in the conversion process as they are simply two different representations of the same objects.

The class and property name mapping or value mapping is specified in the XML mapping file that can be customized on a project by project basis.