Design by interactive exploration using memory-based techniques

Abstract

One of the characteristics of design is that designers rely extensively on past experience in order to create new designs. Because of this, memory-based techniques from artificial intelligence which help store, organise, retrieve, and reuse experiential knowledge held in memory are good candidates for aiding designers. Another characteristic of design is the phenomenon of exploration in the early stages of design configuration. A designer begins with an ill structured, partially defined, problem specification, and through a process of exploration gradually refines and modifies it as his/her understanding of the problem improves. The paper describes DEMEX, an interactive computer-aided design system that employs memory-based techniques to help its users explore the design problems they pose to the system, so that they can acquire a better understanding of the requirements of the problems. DEMEX has been applied in the domain of the structural design of buildings.