Knowledge Base Repository
In addition to research papers, the Design Society is developing several valuable resources for those interested in the study of design. These include a repository of PhD theses, a library of case studies and transcripts of design activities, and an archive of our newsletters. Please note that these resources are accessible exclusively to Design Society members.
CAPTURING THE CONCEPTUAL DESIGN PROCESS WITH CONCEPT-CONFIGURATION-EVALUATION TRIPLETS
Kroll, Ehud; Shihmanter, Alexander
Type:
Year:
2011
Editor:
Culley, S.J.; Hicks, B.J.; McAloone, T.C.; Howard, T.J. & Chen, W.
Author:
Series:
ICED
Section:
Design Information and Knowledge Management
Page(s):
76-85
Abstract:
Design knowledge is a key asset that companies find difficult to capture and access. Since most design is redesign, being able to use prior knowledge effectively is crucial. A record of the design process and the decisions that were made is necessary in order to understand, recreate and modify a design. Not less important is capturing the rationale behind rejected ideas. Various design methods can be used for the conceptual design phase, but most fail to explicitly capture the history and rationale of the process, including the reasons for discarded efforts. This paper demonstrates the need for capturing the design rationale with a textbook example that uses functional decomposition and morphology as the conceptual design method. It then introduces a simple and effective scheme that uses a sequence of triplets of the form concept-configuration-evaluation to describe the desired information. This scheme is based on a conceptual design methodology called parameter analysis, but we show that the proposed means of rationale capture is generally applicable.
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