How Does Brick Compare to X? #

Project Haystack is a popular tagging system for describing building assets using semi-structured sets of tags. Because there are no formal rules for how tags can be used, Haystack-based descriptions of buildings tend to consist of ad-hoc collections of tags, resulting in highly custom and inconsistent modeling practices across sites. Brick includes a tagging system similar to Haystack that augments tags with formal semantic rules that promote consistency and interpretability.

Industry Foundation Classes and Building Information Models emerged from the need for a common exchange model for the 3D architectural drawings needed for a building’s construction. BIM models capture structural information, but lack descriptions of how the constituent equipment and points function together.

Building Topology Ontology (BOT) is a complementary effort for semantic building metadata from the Linked Building Data W3C Community Group that focuses on capturing topological concepts in buildings such as sites, floors, zones and rooms. Because BOT is built using the Semantic Web, it can be used in tandem with Brick.

The Smart Applications REFerence (SAREF) suite of ontologies forms a shared model of consensus intended to enable semantic interoperability between solutions from different providers and among various activity sectors in the Internet of Things (IoT), thus contributing to the development of data spaces.