What is Building: Definition and 918 Discussions

A building, or edifice, is a structure with a roof and walls standing more or less permanently in one place, such as a house or factory. Buildings come in a variety of sizes, shapes, and functions, and have been adapted throughout history for a wide number of factors, from building materials available, to weather conditions, land prices, ground conditions, specific uses, and aesthetic reasons. To better understand the term building compare the list of nonbuilding structures.
Buildings serve several societal needs – primarily as shelter from weather, security, living space, privacy, to store belongings, and to comfortably live and work. A building as a shelter represents a physical division of the human habitat (a place of comfort and safety) and the outside (a place that at times may be harsh and harmful).
Ever since the first cave paintings, buildings have also become objects or canvasses of much artistic expression. In recent years, interest in sustainable planning and building practices has also become an intentional part of the design process of many new buildings and other structures.

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  1. K

    Building a Tesla Coil: What You Need to Know

    I'm getting ready for my Christmas break project and I've settled on building a Tesla coil. I was looking at this << link deleted by Moderators >> but I'm still not really certain about what the components do and why they're needed. I kind of understand what a capacitor and transformer is but...
  2. T

    Calculate the height of a building using scale measurements

    Homework Statement Supposedly, I put an object on a scale inside the elevator of a building, the scale reads m1. I start the elevator to the top of the building, during acceleration, the scale reads m2. As the elevator normalized, the scale reads m1. During the deceleration at the top, the...
  3. S

    How can the weight of the cone influence the work done?

    Homework Statement A great conical mound of height h is built by the slaves of an oriental moarch, to commemorate a victory over the barbarians. If the slaves simply heap up uniform material found at ground level, and if the total weight of the finished mound is M, show that the work they...
  4. B

    Re: Building a hydrodynamics water tunnel for surface water wheel testing.

    I need to simulate the flow of a river, to do small scale hydrodynamics testing on a partially submerged water wheel / paddle wheel design. The typical water tunnel setup will not work, because we are interested in the flow near the surface. The water wheel is half in the water, and half out...
  5. S

    Building Relationships with Professors: Strategies & Tips

    When exactly is one supposed to begin building relationships with their professors, and how? Thus far, I have not needed to interact with my professors beyond them merely lecturing me. I go, learn the material, write their tests, and that's the end of that. I understand that this is something...
  6. R

    Building a solenoid need advice

    I'm intending on creating a solenoid that will project a bb for a class project. I'm using a flash capacitor from a disposable camera as my current source. Here is my question...what is the best "setup" for the solenoid to increase the magnetic force on the bb without increasing its current...
  7. FlexGunship

    Computer Speaker Building: Tips, Advice & Experiences

    Hey folks, I fancy myself as a bit of an audiophile. I love listening. I have a high-end audio interface on my computer with one set of outputs going to a pair of KRK studio monitors and a studio sub, and the other set of outputs going to some Klipsch Promedia general listening speakers...
  8. L

    Building Precise Machine in Home

    Hi, I am interested in building precise machine in home. I don't have a clear idea of what the machine looks like yet. But it involves high precision to do calculation. Is it possible to build such machine myself in home? What tool do I need to use?
  9. Y

    Building a Device with Vertical Pipe and Stepper Motor - Help Needed

    Hello. Im bilding a device. I have 1m vertical pipe with fan in the bottom and stepper motor at the top with sliding ping pong ball in it. (pipe d=45mm, ball d=40mm 2.7g) Stepper controls ping pong high in the pipe. The device is working but mehanics is not my aria at all so...
  10. S

    I need tips and advice for eventually building a synesthetic device

    Disclaimer: I have zero electrical engineering/physics/math experience. In fact, I am a painting major. (Laugh it up) That said, I've been dreaming for quite some time of a very exacting music visualizer which would put all other music visualizers to shame, in that it would have a different...
  11. F

    Building a 6V DC Circuit Switch for Rapid On/Off

    I have looked everywhere for help with this, and I can't find any. I am trying to construct a mechanism that will rapidly switch a DC circuit on and off, anywhere from 10 to 100+ times a second. Ideally this switch should consume as little power as possible, and should be powered by a 6 volt...
  12. V

    Building a simple cosmic ray detector

    During a visit to CERN (more precisely:ATLAS) I got the idea of building a cosmic ray detector from the guide (who was a full time researcher there). The detector would look like a small rectangle with colored stripes going trough it about once a few seconds to signal the path of the muons...
  13. W

    Building a simple electric shocker

    I'm looking to build a basic electric shocker as part of simple game setup I'm making. The shock is not intended to be painful, but it should be somewhat irritating (like a pen shocker toy). However, I'm a little unsure how I'm to go about doing this. Obviously I'll need some sort of DC to AC...
  14. T

    Building a rotary piston engine

    This project is a basic 6 inch rotary piston engine. The rotary engine project is to build a external combustion chamber that will redirect the expanding heat into a rotor housing and turn a rotor with a single piston vane 340 degrees to the exhaust port. The basic piston,rod and crank...
  15. M

    So, I'm building a coil gun

    ...and need some help with a bit of engineering. I've got 5 2200μF capacitors @ 400V (I'm familiar with high voltage + current, just not inductors, and have the appropriate safety gear) in parallel with about .05Ω ESR a piece. These are running into a GE C150 SCR, which can surge up to 1200...
  16. S

    Building a Recoil Simulation Machine for Scope Testing

    I work for a company that manufactures and sells night vision scopes, day time optics, lasers, and pretty much anything that mounts to a weapon. I wanted to test our equipment to see how well it holds up to various recoil of different weapons but ammunition is very expensive and it is very...
  17. B

    Exploring Jet Propulsion: Building a Replica Model of a Hero's Engine

    hi Im currently studying aeronautical engineering at college and needed some ideas for projects and whether they would be pliable or not My current idea: A replica of hero's engine to show the basic principles of jet propulsion but to spice the idea up a little bit, i was thinking about...
  18. A

    Build NOT Gate w/ AND/OR Gates: Possible?

    Is it possible to building one from using AND and OR gates, cause I've been trying and now I'm wondering if it's even possible
  19. L

    Where Should the Safety Net be Placed on a Skyscraper to Catch Falling Debris?

    Homework Statement An architect who is building a skyscraper comes to see you. The architect wishes to place a safety net on the skyscraper, to prevent damage or injury should any of the building's decorative features be dislodged by wind or other forces. What advice can you give her on...
  20. B

    Building a tester for solar cell efficiency

    I am trying to have students build a tester with sourceMeter, lamp, etc. for solar cell efficiency measurement. Could someone give me advice on this project? Thank you very much.
  21. K

    Building a wood bed platform - how much will it support?

    Because of size constraints in my room, I need a platform for my queen size bed that is the exact footprint of the bed (60" x 80"). I've decided to attempt to build it however I have no experience with this and hopefully someone can point out any flaws in my plans. I've attached an image...
  22. P

    Building a least square problem design matrix

    Homework Statement Suppose we want to to fit an arbitrary function f(t) with a polynomial of degree n - 1 using the values of the function in an arbitrary set of points z = [z1; z2; : : : ; zm]. how would do i construct the least squares problem Ax=b. in other words, how would i construct...
  23. X

    Breaking & building a charged hollow sphere

    A charged hollow sphere with surface charge density \sigma & radius R is cut into two hemispheres...certainly the hemispheres with equal charges on them would repel each other...Now a force is applied on both the hemispheres to align them again as the original sphere..i shall be highly thankful...
  24. S

    Building Spectrometer: Signal Level, Footprint & Resolution

    I and my friend, want to build a spectrometer according to below graph basic information to design and build spectrometer are: signal level, Wavelength range, footprint and spectral resolution. we don't know two of them and that are footprint and signal level anybody can help us to...
  25. F

    Job Skills Should I Include Microsoft Word in My Resume Skills?

    It's my first time building one. I am aiming at a lab monitor position. I've included my skills in Mathematica, Maple, TeX (I am going to really TeX this one up to look cool) and some other trivial stuff like Microsoft Word. Any advice? Is it stupid to add microsoft word as part of my skills?
  26. S

    Building a Plot with Array Data: A Challenge

    Hello. I've got an idea to build a plot in real time. What i want to do: 1) I've got a row (array) of numbers 2) for these numbers i calculate values of the expression i want to plot, put them into array, 3) use list plot or smth like that with the row and the array. The question is : how...
  27. H

    Building a Maglev Train Prototype

    1. Hi, I am currently doing a project which the main objective is to build an miniature Maglev Train Prototype and compare its performance with a Conventional Train. 2. I am having a big problem in the propulsion system of the Meglev Train which is the long stator linear synchronous...
  28. S

    Building My Own Particle Accelerator: Starting the Research

    I have set out to do a project to make my own particle accelerator. As of now, I know nothing and I know I have to do extensive research to know my limitations of what I can and cannot do,etc. Since it's a very large subject, I really don't know where to start my research. Right now I'm not...
  29. E

    Calculating Gravity on a Person Inside a Building

    Homework Statement I've posted this in the homework section but really, it was asked by a young kid who had just been learning about gravity in high school science. It made my realize that I wasn't able to provide a superb answer. So, you have a man standing inside a building, what is the...
  30. E

    Light building the standard model

    Something has bothered me for a long time about our model of light: that it has no mass. Just for a moment, forget what you know about light and let's call it the unknown, X, and suppose we want to model it. Here's what we know for certain: X has momentum, as seen by radiation pressure X...
  31. F

    Building a science exhibit demonstrating Bernoulli's Principle

    Hi guys, I'm building a science exhibit demonstrating Bernoulli's Principle for a competition. It's similar to the setup found here () at 2:51 to 2:57. So, I tried a ping pong ball and a hair blower. Doesn't work. Firstly, the hair blower is pretty weak, so when the setup is in upright...
  32. A

    News Bomb blast in Oslo; PM's office building targeted.

    Terror has struck the Norwegian capital today. At 15.26 local time (roughly two hours ago), what appears to have been a car bomb blasted off in the governmental quarters in Oslo. Several have been confirmed dead; although none of our political leasers/ministers seem to be missing/hurt. This a...
  33. T

    Exploring the Intricacies of Building Computer Games

    For almost quite a time I observe that those computer games are remarkably woven carefully to entice gamers. From designing the webpage up to the building up the characters of the games. One of the games I like most is Ragnarok and Angry birds. With the latter I like the way how the game was...
  34. O

    Building a Radio: LCR Meters and Multimeters

    This might be a stupid question, but here goes. I'm trying to build my first radio and I want to know if LCR meters are capable of measuring current and voltage or if I have to purchase a separate multimeter to perform those measurements. Any help would be appreciated.
  35. Ygggdrasil

    Could We Build Unnatural Forms of Life?

    Even though life on Earth spans such diverse creatures from bacteria to humans, at its core, all life on Earth is pretty much the same. Life as we know it uses the same four bases to store information in DNA, the same 20 amino acids to build proteins, and the same genetic code to convert DNA...
  36. R

    Acoustic Resonance of a Building

    A friend of mine and I were having a discussion about acoustic resonance. He theorized that a building could be destroyed by acoustic resonance. Where I disagreed. Thinking that a building doesn't really have an acoustic resonance because of its non-uniformity of being brick and mortar...
  37. H

    What materials are best for building a Helmholtz coil?

    Hello PFs, I need to build some Helmholtz coils, and I was wondering if anybody here had suggestions on what to make the actual rims that hold the wire in a coil are generally made out of? So far its been suggested that I use bicycle rims, but even that creates a question--aluminum or steel...
  38. T

    Building a battery that will last for centuries

    I want to make an heirloom mechanical pendulum clock that is very tradition in design and yet will accurately work for centuries—and so I want to micro adjust the pendulum amplitude automatically and that requires some electricity, not very much electricity, but it will take some small amount of...
  39. M

    Exploring the Universe from the Top of the Empire State Building

    Hi, I read in a book by M. Kaku: "To describe the universe, cosmologists sometimes use the example of looking down from the top of the Empire State Building, which soars more than a hundred floors above Manhattan. As you look down from the top, you can barely see the street level. If the...
  40. R

    Typical building materials for an office building

    Hello all, I'm modelling an office building using Google SketchUp to determine its cooling load during summer. Unfortunately, the default building materials (external walls, floor, roof etc.) seem like they are for residential buildings. Can someone please tell me what are the typical...
  41. L

    Need help/advise with building an electromagnet

    Hello. I'm looking for some assistance with building an electromagnet. Was going to just build it, but want to be on a safe side =)... Due to my chronic Lyme Dis. did forget somethings, and being a son of electrician doesn't really qualify me as an electric engineer. Have googled but came...
  42. G

    Solve for Building Height: Kinematics & Pythagorean Theorem

    Homework Statement A 0.21 kg rock is projected from the edge of the top of a building with an initial velocity of 7.82 m/s at an angle 56 above the horizontal. Due to gravity, the rock strikes the ground at a horizontal distance of 10.5 m from the base of the building. How tall is the...
  43. Greg Bernhardt

    What is this building used for?

    I was in Boston this past weekend and noticed this building. It has no doors. It is located directly above the "big dig" and has security cameras lined around the outside. Any ideas what it houses? It's on the Congress and Atlantic intersection.
  44. W

    How do I calculate the trajectory of a thrown ball onto a roof?

    A ball is thrown from the ground onto a roof of height yroof = 15 m from a distance of x = 7 meters away as shown in the diagram to the left. The maximum height of the ball's trajectory is ymax = 4 meters above the top of the roof. (a) Find the required initial vertical component of the...
  45. X

    Building a Small Closed Wind Tunnel: Resources & Info

    Greetings, for the school I must find some information about the building of a small close wind tunnel . Some one know where to find it? Good day!
  46. C

    Books on engine building or modification

    Hi, I'm looking for some good books on engine building or modification. Any suggestions or preferences would be appreciated.
  47. F

    Building a high flow rate pulsatile pump

    Hi All, I was given the challenge of building a high flow rate pump, but I haven't been able to find any resources were useful. I'd like to control the pump and its pulsatile nature with a LabVIEW VI. I know I'd have to get a stepper motor and a DAQ board, but I'm not sure where to begin. I'd...
  48. S

    Building a Storage Loft: Joist Hangers for Concrete and Drywall

    Hello all. I was hoping someone could help me. I am building a storage loft in my garage. The issue that one side is drywall and metal studs. I was thinking that I would attach joist hangers to the concrete wall, then another set into the drywall wall but I wanted to know if the joist hangers...
  49. W

    Advice on building material for a roadable ultralight aircraft

    I am dead set on building my own ultralight aircraft and I need some advice on construction materials. The aircraft has to weigh less than 254lbs [including engine and prop] and has to support itself, and 500lbs worth of pilot, cargo, fuel, instruments, and eventually a rear wheel drive...
  50. A

    Building a model out of nothing explains a lot.

    If you don't want to hear my, boring philosophy and want to answer what's probably a supid question, its closer to the end. T=0 singularity, a plague of questions just by it's mention follow. Nothing may be the answer. First nothing is a paradox in nature, it has a meaning that states it does...
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