Design tool

About: Design tool is a research topic. Over the lifetime, 3864 publications have been published within this topic receiving 46401 citations.

A pedagogical approach to integrate parametric thinking in early design studios

Abstract: Parametric design has been perceived as a highly sophisticated set of procedures requiring complex specialized softwares, making its introduction as part of undergraduate architectural education difficult. The aim of this study is to explore the possibility of introducing parametric thinking to novice architectural design students, using a purpose-designed non-CAD method. After a detailed lecture, students were asked to use the method to perform a design task based on parametric design principles and inspired by elements from vernacular architecture. Students’ feedback was obtained in regard to three learning domains: Intellectual Skills, Cognitive Strategies, and Affective; and the effects of previous knowledge of CAD and gender were explored. The data was analysed statistically. Results showed that the method has managed to successfully address the three learning domains, with most of the students expressing a strong intention to learn more about Parametricism. Both genders were found to be equally prepared to receive and accept information about parametric design through our method. Students with previous CAD training showed better control over the method, whereas the other group showed better appreciation of the concept. It is concluded that when parametric thinking is seen as a pedagogic intention and not as a design tool, it can be effectively introduced to novice design students, in order to prepare them to meet the demand in practice for graduates who are aware of the recent trends in architectural design and form generation processes, and who are prepared to use the latest digital tools efficiently.

A system and method for creating design configurations and for controlling the execution of multiple design tools

Abstract: A system and method are described for controlling the execution of design tools and for creating design configurations. The system comprises a flow sequencer, a flow map, and a flow configuration object. The flow sequencer controls the execution of design tools in accordance with the flow map and constructs a configuration of its actions in the active flow configuration object. The flow sequencer moves through a flow map executing the actions required by each node of the flow map. At certain nodes the flow sequencer executes design tools. At other nodes the flow sequencer gathers and manipulates data so that a design tool can utilize the data. The configuration is constructed as the nodes of the flow map are executed. The flow sequencer is also capable of analyzing a design to determine whether the data associated with each node is the most current data available. The flow sequencer can identify the nodes where the data is not most current and can re-execute the nodes necessary to update the design. The flow sequencer will execute the minimum number of nodes necessary to update the design. The system also includes a means for debugging a design. At any node the system can stop the execution of the nodes of the flow map and output the current state of the design. The system will then continue executing the nodes from the node at which it stopped the execution of the nodes.

An educational computer-aided tool for heat exchanger design

Abstract: This paper presents the development of an educational computer-aided design tool for the shell and tube heat exchanger. The software integrates the thermo-hydraulics analysis based on Kern method with the mechanical design based on Tubular Exchanger Manufacturing Association (TEMA) Class “C” standard. The software allows the user to experiment with different design specifications and visualize the solutions in the form of performance data and engineering drawings. Technical drawings on the parts of the heat exchanger, like the shell, tube, front and rear header, tube sheet and baffle plate, are produced by the software to assist the user in appreciating issues relating to practical fabrication and costing. Through the correlation of the thermo-hydraulic performance, configurations and dimensions with respect to the technical specifications, it is hoped that the user could better appreciate the fundamentals of heat exchanger design. © 2006 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Comput Appl Eng Educ 14: 77–89, 2006; Published online in Wiley InterScience (www.interscience.wiley.com); DOI 10.1002/cae.20073

Experiment on a system-level design tool

Abstract: System-level design pertains to questions of product or system architecture, configuration, and layout; and as such, provides an important bridge between conceptual engineering design work and detailed design decisions. Prior research indicates that this phase of design is important to successful outcomes of design processes, yet it is not well understood. This paper reports the development and experimental testing of a system-level design tool that aids student designers in improving design quality through enhanced understanding of system-level design issues and alternative selection. We found that use of the tool produced significant improvements in design quality among two experimental groups of mechanical engineering students. By developing and testing this tool, we hope to prove the usefulness of tools that aid engineering design at a system level, particularly in reducing heavily iterative and non-productive tasks.

Loop program mapping and compact code generation for programmable hardware accelerators

Abstract: We present a novel design methodology for the mapping of nested loops onto programmable hardware accelerators. Key features of our approach are: (1) Design entry in form of a functional programming language and loop parallelization in the polyhedron model, (2) the underlying accelerator architectures consist of lightweight, tightly-coupled, and programmable processor arrays, which can exploit both loop-level parallelism and instruction-level parallelism, (3) support of zero-overhead looping not only for inner most loops but also for arbitrarily nested loops. We implemented the proposed methodology in a prototype design tool and evaluated selected benchmarks by comparing our code generator with the Trimaran compilation framework. As the results show, our approach can reduce the size of the generated processor codes up to 64 % while at the same time achieving a significant higher throughput.