Coordinating Information Objects
Our society lacks coordination of real world objects as there is no widely used methodology available for identifying objects and exchanging information on them. Lack of interoperability costs enterprises and users billions of dollars every year. The Pass Project mentioned here and Passcoding-enabled software will help users to reduce coordination problems, save costs, distribute information more easily, and increase their capacity to compete.
Pass ('Phorio asset standardization system') is an open ecosystem for interchanging information, especially about physical assets. Pass has been envisioned by Phorio in cooperation with OSCRE (OSCRE International), RICS (Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors), the German GIF (Gesellschaft für Immobilienwirtschaftliche Forschung e.V.), and the University of Darmstadt (Technische Universität Darmstadt). Pass is under implementation by oversight of Phorio since April 2017.
Pass utilizes methods and processes supported by open technologies to enable the identification, coordination and exchange of data about any real world object that needs coordination throughout its life regardless of its owner, manager, operator, designer, services vendor or other users performing some function. The central part is a public "Passcode" identifier assigned to each real-world asset. Hence, Passcodes will work like an internet addressing space for objects.
Passcoding is the process of identifying an object from given search criteria (such as an address) and exchanging its associated Passdata. Passcoding comes with a high level of functionality including entity identification, resolution of duplicates, quality management, matching and converting, dispute processes, change management, authorization processes, intellectual property management and payment processing. Almost all features are done automatically and can process data in any supported language.
Among the addressed challenges are energy efficiency issues (for example to improve coordination of information about carbon dioxide exhaust over time) and societal challenges (such as connecting people with places in order to ease navigation, speed information flow, and reduce disaster response times).
Current problems of market participants
Everyone has its own data island. The data can hardly be exchanged between different parties, it is not clear which data is available, how reliable it is, and if or under which conditions and pricing it can be accessed.
Almost any organization today assigns a locally unique ID (UID) to its data which is used to manage information locally. But, when assets changes hands the organization-specific ID is lost and, along with it, the key that ties many other bits of information both held by the previous owner and related to it. In addition, an organization that leases a building asset will typically not hold the UID from the owning organization in its information systems; leading to a point of discontinuity in maintaining complete and consistent lifecycle information.
In the emerging world of building information modeling using software applications, building assets and indeed every individual object element in a building information model is associated with a unique identifier so that software can maintain these objects and their associativity when performing modeling and analysis functions. Aggregated object models, such as a piece of furniture, a room, a building or a land parcel are assigned a ‘top-level’ UID for use by the application software and these software object IDs are even regularly associated with an asset UID assigned by the organization. But once again, the software object IDs are local and may be lost when data is moved from one application or system to another (the receiving system assigns its own software object ID) or, if maintained, they may be held as a ‘reference’ ID. Once again, ‘local’ UIDs are susceptible to being lost or corrupted in an asset ownership transfer. The same goes with all data associated with each ID. Plus data fields can change at any time.
As a result, our society lacks coordination of real world objects and other information assets. Individuals and IT systems seeking to share information and services often have difficulties in coordinating data as there is no widely used methodology available for identifying objects and creating a common understanding. At the same time, the amount of data is growing exponentially leading to a lot of false and outdated information without users/providers knowing it. Coordinating data on the internet in combination with data management options will help to reduce duplicate, incorrect, imprecise, outdated or simply wrong data, and it will have a vital importance to many areas of our life and will affect users and businesses all over the planet.
The challenges described above seem to appear in all areas of life where object-oriented information is important. However, the initiators of this proposal decided to prove the feasibility of their approach by starting with a topic they have decades of practical experience in: real estate, buildings and built objects. Phoris acknowledges that Passcoding will have significant usefulness beyond its initial focus, and are designing everything in such a way that it can easily be expanded and adapted by users from other areas of society.
According to NIST, the “cost of a lack of interoperability” in the USA alone is about $15,8 billion per year.
User problems broken down
Solving the problems
The Pass ecosystem is a combination of methods and processes supported by technologies which allow its users to perform actions linked to real-world objects according to their invididual or business needs:
- uniquely identify an object and get/create its unique Passcode (the identifier);
- coordinate between many users and applications that have little, if any, knowledge of each other;
- provide web services for the exchange and management of data so that software platforms can exchange data (Office suite, CRM software, ERP software, CI software, GIS software, etc.).
- attach user rights and licenses to data (who is allowed to read the data and under which prices and conditions).
- allow the exchange system to run vendor-independent and possibly make use of Blockchain technology to distribute data.
Target groups and benefits
A large number of industries is involved in the lifecycle of a built object (see graphic). As a result, the use cases can be enormously diverse and may range from a simple data identification process to data synchronization among different parties in real time.
According to the World Bank, the majority of the enterprises in the world are SMEs (small and medium enterprises). The majority of SME businesses demand useful and practically working services in order to ease dealing with information, including increasing the quantity and quality of (retrieved and submitted) information, staying up-to-date and reducing costs for administering information.
There are millions of organizations out there performing a certain role in a variety of building-related industries and every organization has an individual view on "their" data and requirements. Such organizations come form industries such as (in no certain order) banking sector, architecture and design, real estate, logistics, insurance sector, construction, engineering, navigation, lodging, building product manufacturers, authorities, police, ambulance, fire departments, ...
By using "Passcoding-enabled" software, SMEs can save costs, distribute information more easily, and use gained time to develop and improve their own business performance. This will lead to an overall increase in the capacity to compete.
Passcoding
Passcoding is the process of identifying a Passcode and its Passdata from characteristics and attributes (such as the address, geocoding, meta data, tax registrations, descriptions, etc). The process of validating and assigning a Passcode itself provides a great deal of value including resolution of duplicates, quality management, dispute processes, change management, authorization processes, intellectual property management, payment processing and entity identification. To the greatest extent possible, these functions will be performed automatically in real time, and can be performed in any supported language and data format.
Passcoding will essentially work like an advanced version of geocoding (the process for identifying a location on a map). But unlike geocoding, Passcoding often increases the level of detail from two dimensions (latitude, longitude) to up to five dimensions (latitude, longitude, altitude, time, viewpoint) and provides greater functionality.
Geocoding has two dimensions (latitude, longitude) and does not have data changes
Passcoding has multiple dimensions and its reference data is always changing
A more visual example on how data is mapped and converted with Passcoding using reaction masks.
Use case
Here are different passcoding examples which identify one and the same building using different queries:
50.112, 8.652 - closest building of pathed latitude/longitude
http://www.messeturm-frankfurt.com - by building's website address
messeturm, frankfurt - by market name
goldman sachs frankfurt - by tenant name
Friedrich-Ebert-Anlage 49, frankfurt - by street address
60327, frankfurt am main - by postcode and city
Trade Fair Tower, frankfurt - by building name and city
messe, skyscraper, frankfurt - by sub market names and type
55 étages, 1990, westend, allemagne - by combination of meta data in french
office, ~50 floors, Messeviertel, germany - by combination of building data
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Messeturm - by calling any URI linked to it
...
All these queries return the same result as a data container called a "Passnode":
MesseTurm in 
Frankfurt
But Passnodes will not only carry buildings. They can be used for any information asset (like a data record of a city, a company, a photo, a property transaction, etc).
The data inside a Passnode is delivered to the user in XML or JSON including all public information and meta data describing where to get additional data from and under which conditions. IT systems can then translate these formats into a more readable format such as HTML or PDF.
The more information is flowing through the Pass framework, the better it will be able to aggregate information, rate it, and integrate it (invisibly for the user) into the data Pass backbone. Needless to say, Pass will learn over time about all relevant building assets and it will try to stay up-to-date.
-and-MesseTurm-in-the-background,MesseTurm,-Frankfurt-am-Main.jpg)
The Passcode
The core of a passcoded information object, like the just mentioned MesseTurm object, is the "Passcode". Once a Passcode has been assigned, it is a persistent and worldwide unique identifier for an object and will stay the same over the full lifetime of the entity, across applications, buying or selling transactions - and other boundaries - and will remain valid even after an object has been physically discarded.
A Passcode is conceived to be a generic alphanumeric code assigned to a building-related asset for the purpose of linking the asset to all related assets, records, transactions and analysis. To acquire maximum utility the Passcode should be assigned at the moment of earliest asset conceptualization and never retired; even if the asset physically ceases to exist or if the asset is not physically existing yet. However, the Passcode for an asset may be assigned at any point in the asset lifecycle.
Building assets that are believed to require a Passcode are land parcels, buildings, legally defined sub-buildings (such as condominiums), structures (i.e.: parking structures) and linear assets (i.e.: utility lines, parking and roadways).
In our belief, Passcodes can attain a long-term importance comparable to IP addresses on the internet. Hence, Passcodes will work like an internet addressing space for objects and have a dimension which should be sufficient for many decades even at a high level of use. Unused Passcodes may be recycled after inactivity or deletion. Passcodes can be registered in real time without previous user registration.
Every Passcode compromises of 16 alphanumeric numbers (0-9, a-z, A-Z). This gives room for the expansion of up to a quintillion Passcodes.
Data ranking
Phorio wants to be a central point for the exchange of information assets so that users can exchange information either directly with each other or by using tools provided by Pass. In order to allow anyone or anything to identify a building asset using Pass, information is automatically rated for every submitted information, no matter where this information comes from. Such data management with the use of data ranks is an integral part of Phorio today.
Phorio's data and relation management software organizes how data about information objects is treated. With it, Phorio is creating an exchange gateway for information. The software addresses the needs to modern, sophisticated information management and can overcome previously existing problems in terms of coverage and data quality.
The data management software integrates any relevant information into the system to make the content universally accessible, valuable and useful. It features a variety of programs which take care of the fully automated management, control and qualification of content. The programs provide a powerful way to solve currently existing problems which a lot of content-related IT systems have. However, the degree of data excellence is the most important one.
Each nucleus of information (an entity, an attribute of an entity or an aggregation of it) is assigned a rating - the so-called "Datarank". It expresses how complete, valid, consistent, timeliness and accurate the information is. The Datarank ranges from 1..12 (1=lowest value, 12=highest value). A Datarank above "5" expresses that information is considered to be reliable. The contributor who submitted a specific information is an indicator for the quality, as well as how the content was gathered, the source, and optionally a proof of its existance - for anyone who like to confirm it without having access to the primary source.
Information which comes from an architect has a higher weighting than the submission of someone who is not known yet (and does not have a track record). A submission with no source indication has less weight than one with one. This means that a contribution from someone with a track record, who uses a trusted source with a proof of existance will have the highest reliability. Other contributions can change any data and by doing so the Pass system will learn over time how good your submissions are. The more people contribute and the more content is available the better the system will work, and not vice versa. The software allows manual additions by users and mass imports.
Summary
Achieving the goals of collaborative, lifecycle building-related asset management requires a unique and persistent identifier that stays with the asset throughout its life regardless of the owner, manager, operator, design team, services vendor or other actor performing some function relative to the asset. All industries dealing with built objects need a unique identifier for use with building assets; ie: land parcels, buildings, portions of buildings with individual ownership such as condominiums, structures such as parking garages, and linear assets such as utilities, parking & roadways. That's why Phorio is actively developing thousands of data standards in order to make Pass useful for the world.
