A web-based user guide for Sri Lanka standards 573: standard method of measurement of building works

A brief investigation revealed that the Sri Lanka Standards 573 (SLS573): Standard Method of Measurement of Building Works (SMM), which was first revised in 1999, is generally used in the industry. However, it is also viewed that the SMM is not popular enough because of several issues. This research was aimed at identifying such issues and compiling a "Web-Based User Guide" to make it popular in the industry. The research was focussed on to investigating the problem areas of the SMM SLS 573 and to group them under three headings namely; Measurement rules which do no match to local needs, Areas where clarification is required and Omissions where no measurement rules have been given. The questionnaire survey received a poor response thus a selected number of professionals were interviewed using semi-structured interviews. It was revealed that many people were reluctant to use the SLS573 because of the ambiguities and non-conformity to local practices. With these findings of the research a user friendly and easy to use electronic user guide was developed. This is called as the Web-Based User Guide and it has many advantages over the other methods of popularising the SMM. It is hoped that this new concept will have a changing effect in the industry and the process of standardisation will be a success.