Aspects of distributed conceptual design support

[摘要] ENGLISH ABSTRACT:The findings of an investigation into the requirements of a support system fordistributed conceptual design in small and medium enterprises are presented.Distributed conceptual design refers to the collaboration of spacially distributed designteams during the early stages of the product development process.Three main elements of a support system were identified. The first element, 'DesignMethodology', places a framework for specification development, functional analysis,concept generation and concept evaluation at the designers' disposal. It systematicallyguides the users through the different steps of the design process. These steps can beperformed either alone, or together with other team members. The users are also aidedin documenting their steps in order to allow the team members or designers of followupprojects to understand the decisions made.The second element, 'Communication and Information Transfer', co-ordinates thecommunication between the distributed designers and provides a platform for theexchange of design-related data, e.g. customer requirements, ideas, sketches, comments,and decisions. A case study was carried out to assess the use of various tools forcommunication and information transfer during synchronous and asynchronouscollaboration. The case study is described and the results are presented and discussed.Both elements make use of a support service providing various 'Input Devices forConceptual Design', the third element of a support system. While standard tools such asmouse and keyboard meet the requirements of subsequent stages of the design process,they are often impractical in creating or annotating sketches. Various low-cost inputdevices were investigated.A framework was developed to integrate the three elements into one support system.The 'Distributed Design Assistant', abbreviated as 'DiDeas', is an Internet-basedsystem that allows simultaneous multi-user collaboration. A relational database islocated on a central web-server and stores all design information entered into thesystem. The user interface was realized in the form of a collection of Microsoft ActiveServer Pages, which can be accessed platform-independently via a standard webbrowser.The development of the database structure and of the user interface isdescribed in detail. A second case study was carried out to evaluate the DistributedDesign Assistant. The case study is described and the results are presented anddiscussed.The low-cost system has proven to be a very useful tool for distributed conceptualdesign. The Distributed Design Assistant systematically guides novice and experienceddesigners through the stages of specification development and conceptual design. Itfacilitates the easy collection and the fast exchange of a large amount of textual andgraphical information during these stages. Although the system is relatively simple,compared to professional product data management systems used in later stages of thedesign process, it strongly enhances the productivity of designers and distributed designteams.Keywords: Distributed Design, Conceptual Design, Systematic Product Development

[发布机构] Stellenbosch University