Computer assisted anti-seismic design— the detached houses case study

Abstract Some areas, mainly located in the Southeastern part of France, are characterized by a high seismicity, and the French regulation is rapidly evolving to cope in a satisfactory way with such a major risk. Suitable construction rules to handle various seismic risk levels have been enacted since 1969, and recently simplified measures have been proposed to ensure the protection of detached houses. Straightforward recommendations known as technical solutions, avoiding complex computations, provide an efficient framework adapted to widen the correct use of the techniques contributing to a satisfactory construction design in good compliance with compulsory legal requirements. An intelligent software was devised to ease a step by step computer assisted design process, and to check the correctness of the final construction proposal with regards to constraints arising from the regulation. We describe the cognitive model taking in charge the formal representation of the many entities involved, we present the software implementation accounting for the complex network of inter-dependent concepts, and finally explain the reasoning policies used to provide the system with intelligent capabilities. A short summary of the possible results is reviewed including the labelling of the task-based reasoning path with solutions corresponding to the correction of faulty dispositions, and concluding with a comprehensive report on the project submitted, bringing for each rule fired the analysis of the alleged configuration recognized.