This paper proposes a framework for the modeling and evaluation of product design problems in a computer network-oriented design environment. The goal is to provide designers with the ability to rapidly construct integrated design problem models that reflect interactions between subproblems, facilitating collaborative design work and reducing development time while improving product quality. Ultimately, it should allow specialized engineering analysis applications, product data management systems, CAD models and design problem models to operate under a common design environment. Product topology of a battery-powered cordless drill and its decomposition into modules blem. Modules interact with one another through services that allow the exchange of information.
Modules can encapsulate engineering models and data or software applications.
The method is extended to create a distributed object-based modeling and evaluation framework, enabling the modeling and evaluation of design problems in the distributed design environment. After reviewing the elements of the proposed framework, its preliminary software implementation is described and demonstrated for a cordless drill design problem. Get Adobe Acrobat Reader . View the slide show. Slides may open in a new window.