Design Knowledge Collection by Modeling

Abstract

Since design is a process in which designers use various kinds of knowledge and it is an open-ended problem, it is difficult to prepare all necessary knowledge before design. Also, due to advances of technology, design knowledge is largely fragmental and compartmentized. This makes the communication among design experts or design agents difficult. Due to these, a knowledge sharing mechanism among agents based on a common ontology is needed even for collecting design knowledge. In this paper, first we analyze the nature and structure of design knowledge. Then, we propose a knowledge collection methodology through design object modeling and verify the method with an example of the suspension design for a motorcycle. Finally, we identify knowledge that should be prepared before the design process and that can be collected during modeling processes.