EDITORIAL
Technical Council for Computing and Information Technology
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Hani G. Melhem, Ph.D., P.E., M.ASCE TCCIT/EXCOM 2008 Chair, Martin Eby Professor in Engineering, Dept. of Civil Engineering, Kansas State Univ., Manhattan, KS 66506. E-mail:
[email protected]
rent EXCOM during its meeting in Austin, Texas, on June 6, 2008. Starting in October of this year, this liaison position will be held for two-year terms, subject to renewal. This position is expected to generate potential collaborations for the TCCIT in Europe, Asia, South America, and other parts of the world.
R. Raymond Issa, Ph.D., J.D., P.E., M.ASCE TCCIT/EXCOM 2008 Vice Chair, Rinker Professor, and Director of Graduate and Distance Education Programs, Rinker School of Building Construction, Univ. of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611. E-mail:
[email protected]
Administrative Committees As mentioned above, the Advisory Committee, the Education Committee, and the Publications Committee are considered the administrative committees of the TCCIT.
Introduction and Organization The Technical Council on Computing and Information Technology 共TCCIT兲 operates under the auspices of the Technical Activities Council 共TAC兲 of ASCE. The TCCIT was authorized by the TAC in January of 1973. Its current mission is “to advance professional knowledge and improve the practice of civil engineering by encouraging the effective use of current and emerging computing and information technologies.” Prior to 1997, it was known as the Technical Council for Computing Practices 共TCCP兲, and was conducting almost the same type of activities, but under a slightly different mission statement. The TCCIT has an executive committee 共EXCOM兲, three administrative committees 共Advisory Committee, Education Committee, and Publications Committee兲 and two technical committees 共Intelligent Computing Committee and Database and Information Management Committee兲. In addition, ASCE has a Global Center of Excellence in Computing that falls under the umbrella of the TCCIT. A detailed account of the history of computing in civil engineering, the role of the TCCIT, and the stream of ASCE conferences on computing was published a few years ago at the onset of the celebration of ASCE’s 150th anniversary 共Fenves and Rasdorf 2001兲.
Executive Committee The EXCOM includes five voting members who follow a rotation cycle: member at large, secretary, vice chair, chair, and then past chair. In October of every year, a new person is selected to join the committee for a five-year term to become the new member at large, as the past chair concludes his or her term and leaves the committee. The EXCOM also has a person to serve as liaison for the council’s international activities. Since 2002, Professor Ian Smith 共from L’École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, or EPFL兲 diligently served in this role and represented the European Group for Intelligent Computing in Engineering 共EG-ICE兲. The position resulted in great collaboration with the European computing community. The EXCOM membership rotation and the international liaison position were recently modified by the cur-
Advisory Committee The Advisory Committee is composed of the past three chairs of the EXCOM, with the immediate past chair serving as the head of the advisory committee. Its purpose is to assist and advise the EXCOM concerning council affairs and to provide it with advice on awards in which the council has an interest. An example of such awards is the ASCE Computing Award. This prestigious award was established in 1995 and is given every year to a member of ASCE to recognize this person’s outstanding achievement and contribution in the use of computers in the practice of civil engineering. More details about this award, such as the nomination process and the list of past recipients, can be found on the ASCE Web site 共http://www.asce.org/pressroom/honors/ computingគceaward.cfm兲. This year the award will be announced and presented during the ASCE workshop on Computing in Civil Engineering in June 2009 in Austin, Texas 共http://www.caee. utexas.edu/asceIT2009兲. Education Committee The Education Committee studies and promotes educational uses of computers in the field of civil engineering, promotes the exchange of information regarding computer methods within the civil engineering profession, and recommends to the Society those computer-related activities that will promote the educational objectives of colleges and universities. Publications Committee The purpose of the Publications Committee is to administer the solicitation, review, and editing of manuscripts submitted for publication in the Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering 共JCCE兲, which is the formal publication channel of ASCE in the area of computing. The JCCE was established in 1987 as a quarterly and became a bimonthly journal at the beginning of its twentieth year, starting in January 2006. It serves as a resource for researchers, practitioners, and students on advances and innovative ideas in computing as applicable to the engineering profession. Many such
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ideas emerge from recent developments in computer science, information science, computer engineering, knowledge engineering, and other technical fields. Some examples are innovations in artificial intelligence, parallel processing, distributed computing, graphics and imaging, sensing, ontologies, and information technology. The Journal publishes research, implementation, and applications in cross-disciplinary areas. Details about the Journal scope, topics, and publication trends during its first twenty years can be found in a review paper it published a couple of years ago 共Abudayyeh et al. 2006兲. The journal has undergone some recent changes in its editorial board and in its vision for the future, which are described in a recent editorial article of the journal 共Garrett and Soibelman 2008兲.
Technical Committees The technical committees of the TCCIT currently are the Intelligent Computing Committee 共IC兲 and the Database and Information Management 共DIM兲 Committee. Intelligent Computing Committee The mission of the IC Committee is to gather, maintain, and disseminate information on the application of expert systems and artificial intelligence to civil engineering and to keep the Society membership aware of developments in this rapidly growing field. The IC Committee has been, and is currently, involved in the planning, organization, and management of several technical sessions at specialty conferences, workshops, and joint meetings with other organizations, as well as special issues of the Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering and technical monographs. Database and Information Management Committee The mission of the DIM Committee is to increase the appropriate use of databases and information management technologies in civil engineering teaching and practice. The committee scope includes the representation, management, storage, retrieval, and analysis of civil engineering information, product and process modeling, data/object repositories and interoperability standards, and information infrastructure issues. Similar to the IC Committee, DIM has been and is currently involved in the planning, organization, and management of several technical sessions at conferences, as well as special issues of the Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering and technical monographs.
Center is provided in a recent JCCE editorial 共Arciszewski et al. 2007兲 and is available on the center’s Web site 共http://www. asceglobalcenter.org兲.
Coordination of Computing Activities In addition to its main archival journal 共the JCCE兲, the TCCIT is responsible for producing conference proceedings, special publications, and monographs on computing-related topics. The series of eight ASCE conferences on Computing in Civil Engineering were held every one to three years in the following U.S. cities: Atlanta 共1978兲, Baltimore 共1980兲, San Diego 共1984兲, Boston 共1986兲, Alexandria, Virginia 共1988兲, Atlanta 共‘89兲, Washington, D.C. 共1991兲, and Dallas 共1992兲. Starting in 1994, ASCE held a series of five annual congresses on Computing in Civil Engineering in Washington, D.C. 共1994兲, Atlanta 共1995兲, Anaheim 共1996兲, Philadelphia 共1997兲, and Boston 共1998兲. More recently, ASCE/ TCCIT organized a workshop on IT in Civil Engineering in Washington, D.C. in 2002, an International Symposium on IT in Civil Engineering in Nashville in 2003; an IT Symposium on Computational Intelligence in Baltimore in 2004, an International Conference on Computing in Civil Engineering in Cancun, Mexico, in 2005; and an International Workshop on Computing in Civil Engineering in Pittsburgh in 2007. It is also planning another workshop on Computing in Civil Engineering in Austin on June 24–27, 2009. Over the years, ASCE has had a tradition of successful collaboration with other international organizations involved with computing. In addition to strong participation in the international events outside the United States, the TCCIT has sponsored and hosted the 5th, and 8th International Conferences on Computing in Civil and Building Engineering 共ICCCBE兲 in Anaheim 共1993兲 and Stanford 共2000兲, respectively. It has also organized and hosted the Fourth Joint International Symposium on IT in Civil Engineering, cosponsored by the European Group for Intelligent Computing in Engineering 共EG-ICE兲. In most ICCCBE and EGICE conferences and workshops held outside the United States, the TCCIT has had a remarkable presence and active participation as a main cosponsor of these events through organizing sessions, presenting papers, and holding joint meetings. In general, ASCE/ TCCIT members enjoy collaboration with their colleagues around the world and are pleased to participate in international events that involve computing and information technology. This is demonstrated by TCCIT members presenting papers, chairing individual sessions, organizing sessions, and being part of the conference scientific committee and editorial board of such events.
Global Center of Excellence in Computing Invitation The Global Center has as its main mission the development of the Civil Engineering Computing Body of Knowledge, including preparation of the self-contained teaching modules for global use, maintaining and updating the center’s taxonomy of the Computing Body of Knowledge, and updating the existing 共available for downloading兲 15 modules. The center is also involved in the development of a large international research program on Civil Engineering Ontology, in preparation by a team of researchers from several universities in the United States, Hong Kong, and the United Kingdom. The Global Center is also planning an NSF-sponsored workshop in Nairobi, Kenya, in January 2009 共15 U.S. participants with delegations from several African countries, the U.K., and Switzerland兲. More information on the Global
The TCCIT and its various committees and activities provide opportunities for participation and professional development to all ASCE members. You are invited to join any of the technical committees described above, attend meetings, and present your research and engineering professional activities at TCCITsponsored conferences and workshops, submit your best research results and developments to the Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering, and suggest new initiatives and project activities to the TCCIT leadership. The TCCIT provides travel support for officers and active participants in its administrative and technical committees, and provides its members with great opportunities to develop professional contacts around the world. The current lead-
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ership of the TCCIT and officers of its committees started their membership as young scholars and professionals and would like to encourage all ASCE members to seriously consider being active participants in the various council activities.
References
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Abudayyeh, O., Dibert-DeYoung, A., Rasdorf, W., and Melhem, H. 共2006兲. “Research publication trends and topics in Computing in Civil
Engineering.” J. Comput. Civ. Eng., 20共1兲, 2–12. Arciszewski, T., Smith, I. F. C., and Melhem, H. 共2007兲. “ASCE global center of excellence in computing.” J. Comput. Civ. Eng., 21共3兲, 147– 150. Fenves, S. J., and Rasdorf, W. J. 共2001兲. “Role of ASCE in the advancement of computing in civil engineering.” J. Comput. Civ. Eng., 15共4兲, 239–247. . Garrett, J. H., Jr., and Soibelman, L. 共2008兲. “The new editors and their plans for the Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering.” J. Comput. Civ. Eng., 22共4兲, 231–232.
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