IfcColumn / Load bearing or not?!?!?

Hi,
while I was going through the IFC4 ADD2, I came accross this interesting definition.

IfcColumn is a vertical structural member which often is aligned with a structural grid intersection. It represents a vertical, or nearly vertical, structural member that transmits, through compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. It represents such a member from an architectural point of view. It is not required to be load bearing.
http://www.buildingsmart-tech.org/ifc/IFC4/Add2/html/link/ifccolumn.htm

It is not required to be load bearing???
All of the three first sentences described this element as a structural column that carries loads. So how can this column not be load bearing?
Well, in my 15 years experience…I have never build a structural column that transmits weight and was not load bearing at the same time. If it is non load bearing, that mean it is also non structural. Am I missing something here?

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Agree with you, @agron. Something wrong with that definition and it should be fixed.

In my opinion it can be used for both domains (structural and architectural). It depends on the property ‘LoadBearing’ of ’ Pset_ColumnCommon’.
LoadBearing : Indicates whether the object is intended to carry loads (TRUE) or not (FALSE).
However, as you say…its definition is very confusing

I am fully aware that the column can be either load bearing or not, which is defined in the Pset.
But based on this definition we are dealing here with structural columns which are load bearing.

I personally prefer to not have to distinguish between a class for structural columns and one for columns which are not “intended” to be structural, just like walls (where there are more examples of not being LoadBearing).

Having a property “LoadBearing” precisely allows you to specify this.

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Agree with you,
Why developers are not paying attention to your post , no good reply found till now.

I agree with you about this and the P_Set ist correct. I also would not want an additional entity just for non load bearing columns. I believe that the whole description of this entity should be generalized since in the beginning it talks ONLY about load bearing columns. It is like talking about “this is an apple tree that has apples,…, but its not a tree”.

So my suggestion would be for example:

“IfcColumn is a vertical structural member which often is aligned with a structural grid intersection. In most cases it represents a vertical, or nearly vertical, structural member that transmits, through compression, the weight of the structure above to other structural elements below. It represents such a member from an architectural point of view. In other cases it might also represent a non load bearing element.”

does it sound more clear?

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A confusing description is with " the weight of the structure above … " as well.
If something is above the column, it creates some load in any case. That means it’s not possible a non load bearing case according to this description.
Another inaccuracy is with a “through compression”. Not necessarily all columns are affected by compressive forces. I agree that compression is the main impact to a column, but bending is quite a usual impact as well created by lateral forces (wind).

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A modest proposal:
A column is an essentially linear vertical or nearly vertical member. It’s typical function is to transmit structural loads by axial compression. However, it may serve other structural or architectural purposes.

For closure: Proposal to make the description of IfcColumn less self-contradictory ¡ Issue #47 ¡ buildingSMART/IFC4.3.x-development ¡ GitHub