Maps are visual design representations used by engineers to model the information behind a design. This paper evaluates the application of mapping methods supported by the Decision Rationale editor (DRed) in aerospace engineering industry. Specifically, the research investigates what DRed mapping methods are used, where engineers find them useful and why. DRed was selected because it has been formally embedded in the design processes of the partner company and all engineering staff have access to it. The tool was investigated using semistructured interviews with 14 engineers, each already trained with DRed through their work and representing diverse departments and experience levels. Nineteen use cases were collected, ranging from high-profile, multistakeholder projects to everyday individual work. Collected cases were analyzed for the methods applied, common contexts of use, and reasons for use. The results validate baseline DRed mapping methods to capture design rationale and analyze the root causes of engineering problems. Further, it provides empirical evidence for new DRed mapping methods to manage requirements, analyze functional interactions in complex systems and manage personal information. The contexts where mapping methods are most used involve: system-level information that cuts across subsystem boundaries; irregular intervals between map applications; dealing with loosely structured information; individual use or small team collaborations; and addressing on-going problems. The reasons stated by engineers for using maps focus on engineering design thinking, communication, and planning support. Using empirical evidence of its recurrent use, this research establishes that DRed is a powerful and versatile tool for engineers in industry and its mapping methods aid important and otherwise unsupported work. The range and impact of the use cases found in practice suggest that engineers need better support for work with loosely structured information. Organizations involved in the design of complex systems should make greater use of semiformal, graph-based visual tools like DRed. The understanding of mapping software gained through this research demonstrates a shift in emphasis from the enrichment of the engineering record to the provision of immediate cognitive benefits for engineers. The results also support an incremental, adaptive approach for deploying this emerging class of tools in other organizations.

Objective: The process of understanding the causes of adverse events associated with complex engineered systems can be time consuming and expensive. It often requires substantial human and physical resources ranging from a few engineers up to multiple teams of domain specialists from collaborating organisations. The research presented in this article aims to provide more effective support to the analysts involved in root cause analysis (RCA) by exploring the combined application of the Issue Based Information System (IBIS) and the Function Analysis Diagram (FAD) methods. The first method (IBIS) introduces the concept of argument-based rationale for explicit justification of the nodes of a cause effect chain as well as of redesign decisions, while the second method (FAD) introduces the notion of structure-dependent functional modelling of complex systems in normal and failure states.Method: Causation data from publicly available technical reports of the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster was reverse-engineered using a root cause analysis approach based on the IBIS and FAD notations. IBIS and FAD were implemented using a free and open source software tool known as designVUE. The approach was evaluated by comparing it to a method for root cause analysis widely used in industry and assessing how it satisfies generic requirements for root cause analysis.Results: The results show that the proposed IBIS-FAD approach provides a rich description of the causes for an accident presented in a manner that facilitates information access and understanding. The IBIS notation allowed for explicit modelling of the reasons supporting or refuting failure hypotheses along with evidence. The FAD notation provided a clear and concise method to visualise the complex set of non-linear interactions leading to the failure of a system by annotating graphical schematics of the design with the functions exchanged between its components. Finally, the results show that the approach supports the capture and justification of redesign decisions and ties them to initiating problems in a way that promotes the prevention of accident re-occurrence.Conclusions: Argument-based rationale with IBIS and FAD-style functional modelling are powerful concepts to extend the tool set available to support the root cause analysis process. The approach proposed in this article provides a unique tool that would be of value to academics, practitioners, and regulators concerned with root cause analysis and opportunities to improve the process of understanding adverse events. (C) 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

Abstract Understanding product functions is a key aspect of the work undertaken by engineers involved in complex system design. The support offered to these engineers by existing modeling tools such as the function tree and the function structure is limited because they are not intuitive and do not scale well to deal with real-world engineering problems. A research collaboration between two universities and a major power system company in the aerospace domain has allowed the authors to further develop a method for function analysis known as function analysis diagram that was already in use by line engineers. The capability to generate and edit these diagrams was implemented in the Decision Rationale editor, a software tool for capturing design rationale. This article presents the intended benefits of the method and justifies them using an engineering case study. The results of the research have shown that the function analysis diagram method has a simple notation, permits the modeling of product functions together with structure, allows the generation of rich and accurate descriptions of product functionality, is useful to work with variant and adaptive design tasks, and can coexist with other functional modeling methods.

During product development, engineering designers raise several information requests that make them search through human and documentary sources. This paper reports research to characterise, in detail, these requests for designers working in a major aerospace engineering company. The research found that at a high level, a distinction can be made between requests to acquire information and to process information. The former are raised to access design and domain information. The latter, instead, are formed to define designs. For researchers, this study extends existing knowledge of information requests by characterising key differences in their nature and explaining how they are used in the design process. For practitioners, these findings can be used as a basis to understand the diverseness of information requests and how to channel efforts to support designers in information seeking. In particular, the research indicates that a strategy to support designers should enable the development of engineering communities that share information effectively and the introduction of techniques that facilitate the documentation of information.

In modern engineering projects collaboration between organisations is increasingly common for the purpose of sharing expertise, technology, resources, risk and responsibilities. Design communication between collaborating organisations, which is central to the successful development of the design process, takes place over distributed environments, and a range of computer and communication technologies are available to support it. However, none of existing technologies aid engineers in the communication of the nuances and subtleties of engineering design work. This research, in collaboration with the engineering business of a large power system company, argues that for design communication to be effective, stakeholders have to have shared understanding and this is formed by interpreting design rationale. In the paper, this argument is used to explain the success of a software tool, known as DRed, to support the communication between engineers in the collaborating company and those from partner organisations. Case studies of practical application of the DRed tool to support communication with organisations in the supply chain of the partner company are presented and discussed.

Design knowledge can be acquired from various sources and generally requires an integrated representation for its effective and efficient re-use. Though knowledge about products and processes can illustrate the solutions created (know-what) and the courses of actions (know-how) involved in their creation, the reasoning process (know-why) underlying the solutions and actions is still needed for an integrated representation of design knowledge. Design rationale is an effective way of capturing that missing part, since it records the issues addressed, the options considered, and the arguments used when specific design solutions are created and evaluated. Apart from the need for an integrated representation, effective retrieval methods are also of great importance for the re-use of design knowledge, as the knowledge involved in designing complex products can be huge. Developing methods for the retrieval of design rationale is very useful as part of the effective management of design knowledge, for the following reasons. Firstly, design engineers tend to want to consider issues and solutions before looking at solid models or process specifications in detail. Secondly, design rationale is mainly described using text, which often embodies much relevant design knowledge. Last but not least, design rationale is generally captured by identifying elements and their dependencies, i.e. in a structured way which opens the opportunity for going beyond simple keyword-based searching. In this paper, the management of design rationale for the re-use of design knowledge is presented. The retrieval of design rationale records in particular is discussed in detail. As evidenced in the development and evaluation, the methods proposed are useful for the re-use of design knowledge and can be generalised to be used for the retrieval of other kinds of structured design knowledge.

Concept mapping software is emerging as a powerful tool for supporting complex thinking. The Decision Rationale editor (DRed) provides an illustrative example from industry. Eight years after its development, 700+ engineers in Rolls-Royce have received direct training, others have adopted it independently and it is increasingly used for knowledge management, creativity and communication. This study seeks lessons from these experiences to inform broader map-based tools and methods development.Semi-structured interviews were performed with 11 professionals ranging from junior engineers to chief designers. A qualitative analysis of transcripts and sample maps examined the value of new features and methods in practical contexts.Results suggest mapping is often the "path of least resistance" to organise unstructured ideas and conflicting perspectives. The flexible nature of maps, however, presents challenges for standardising methods. Feature development will require a continued balance of simplicity, learnability and functionality supported by integrated help documentation.

Designing is a knowledge-intensive activity. For novice design engineers, an important means of acquiring knowledge is to consult experienced colleagues. We observed novice–expert consultations as part of three engineering projects in a large aerospace company. Seven meetings were analysed in detail regarding the design activity, the content, and the form of interaction. Although the meetings were initiated for the purpose of information seeking , this process amounted to only 8% of the time compared to knowledge creation between novices and experts (47% of meeting time), and contextual information sharing (45% of meeting time). Both experts and novices were found to contribute equally and interactively to the discussion and analysis of solutions. The analysis showed how the processes alternated in the meetings. We identified tentative patterns on how these consultation processes change over the course of the design process phases. The micro-level analysis of the design activities and form of interaction provided a deeper understanding of how the consultation processes are discursively produced by the experts and novices. Finally, implications for design engineering practitioners are derived and suggestions for further research are provided.

There has been a significant loss of spatial thinking support in the move from paper to computer-based work. Map-based software methods reported here fill this gap while resolving general challenges in deploying software tools into active industrial practice.The Decision Rationale editor (DRed) has been in use over nine years and 700 engineers have been trained within the partner company. Semi-structured interviews were performed with 13 engineers from diverse departments and with a range of experience levels. Collected examples were analysed for successful methods (what), common contexts of use (where) and advantages over existing tools (why).Map use seems to focus on problems where multiple poorly defined options need sorting in order to progress work. The diversity of use cases demonstrates a need for increased investment in flexible visual tools to aid human thinking. Future work will expand on the set of collected examples, including attempts to generalize lessons to other software. More detailed experiments are also needed to better understand specific cognitive benefits in the work environment.

Understanding users increases the likelihood that the final designed product will meet the needs of heterogeneous people (Kouprie and Sleeswijk Visser, 2009). However, the process of learning to understand users and their experiences requires qualitative research (Mattelmäki and Battarbee, 2002) and a structured investment of time that can be achieved through the development of a manageable design plan in the early stages of design (Yang and Epstein, 2005). Although the fields of accessibility and usability have made significant advances in the last decade in facilitating the design of products and services that satisfy the needs of different users and are easy to use, the majority of design companies still fail to acknowledge users’ needs early on in the design process (Gulliksen et al., 2003). This is because of, among other things, tight schedules and a limited budget (Dong, 2005).

Understanding product functions is a key aspect of the work undertaken by engineers involved in complex system design. The support offered to these engineers by existing modeling tools such as the Function Tree and the Function Structure is limited as they are not intuitive and do not scale well to deal with real world engineering problems. A research collaboration between two universities and a major power system company in the aerospace domain has allowed the authors to further develop a method for function analysis known as Function Analysis Diagram (FAD) which was already in use by line engineers. The capability to generate and edit these diagrams was implemented in the Decision Rationale editor (DRed) a software tool for capturing design rationale. This article presents the main beneficial characteristics of the method and justifies them using two engineering case studies. The results of the research have shown that the FAD method has a simple notation, permits the modeling of product functions together with structure, allows the production of rich and accurate descriptions of product functionality and is suitable to represent complex problems.

Understanding the performance and manner of functioning of existing products is at the base of new product development activities. In engineering design the term function is generally used to refer to the technical actions performed by a product. However, products accomplish a wider range of goals. This research explores the opportunity to describe and model, through the concept of function, product actions across four dimensions including technical, aesthetic, social and economic. The research demonstrates that non-technical functions can be represented through active verbs and nouns and modelled using a method known as the Function Analysis Diagram (FAD). The research argues that when technical, aesthetic, social and economic perspectives on product development are considered as different types of function, stakeholders have a common language to communicate which can benefit design collaboration.

The increasing occurrence of interdiscipli nary product development has removed many traditional constraints and given the designer a much wider freedom of choice of means of satisfying any given statement of requirements. Schemebuilder, a comprehensive , intelligent knowledge-based design package, aims to support the designer in the conceptual through embodiment stages of design, providing guidance on the range of options available. In the field of energetic systems, bond graph methodology, possessing as it does a common structure and clear causal rules across engineering domains, forms an admirable basis for Schemebuilder development. This paper describes how the conceptual scheme generation process may be assisted and structured by the use of function-mean s trees developed by the application of bond graph-inspired rules.

Engineering design thinking combines concepts from heterogeneous sources like personal experience, colleagues, digital and hardcopy media. Despite this challenge, modes of thinking across levels of abstraction through multi-dimensional (spatial) representations are widely neglected in digital support systems. This paper aims to summarize lessons learned through years of experience with software tools that augment this visio-spatial conceptual thinking. This work cuts across disciplines to provide a needed, coherent starting point for other researchers to examine complex outstanding issues on a class of promising support tools which have yet to gain widespread popularity. Three studies are used to provide specific examples across design phases, from conceptual design to embodiment. Each study also focuses on an exemplar of diagrammatic software: the University of Cambridge Design Rationale editor (DRed), the Institute for Human Machine Cognition's (IHMC) CmapTools and the Open University's Compendium hypermedia tool. This synthesis reiterates how hypermedia diagrams provide many unique, valuable functions while indicating important practical boundaries and limitations. Future research proposed includes: a need to build more diagrammatic literacy into engineering practice, the need for more detailed studies with experts in industry and specific directions for refining the hypermedia diagram software interfaces.

This study investigated processes in novice–expert consultation meetings in an organizational context to identify ‘what’ is done ‘how’ by novices and expert in consultation discourses. A conceptual model was developed for studying novice–expert design discourses at a fine-resolution level. An empirical study was performed at Rolls-Royce Aerospace Engineering. In total 7 audio-records were captured of meetings between trainees (novices) and expert designers, which occurred over the course of 3 trainee teams’ design projects. Relations were investigated between two coding schemes, namely the activity coding scheme and the conversational flow coding scheme. It was found that certain activities in the meeting were more often performed by either novices or experts, whereas other activities were more often performed collaboratively. Based on the results, implications for design engineering practitioners were derived and suggestions for further research are provided.

There is strong evidence of the importance of good interaction design to intuitive use of products. However, the underlying issue is that designers get little support in adequately representing, analysing and comparing design and user information. This paper proposes a new data modelling approach for designers, which in four distinct stages enables to assess and compare designers and users’ understanding and usage of everyday products. The preliminary results indicate that it can contribute to the design of more inclusive products but its usefulness in industry is yet to be properly evaluated.

The design of complex systems requires accurate planning and sequencing of the processes into task and activities Companies such as the aerospace engine manufacturers demand effective methods and tools to support engineering designers in their tasks and activities This paper presents exploratory research to investigate the possibility of supporting design activities through a question based approach Sets of generic questions are extracted from the analysis of the question types proposed in previous research The paper proposes that designers could be guided into their de sign inquiries by consulting the generic questions identified in this research and design knowledge indexes

Engineering design activities rely heavily on the richness of knowledge and information available. In order to progress their tasks, designers undertake numerous searches to answer their information requests. A review of the literature on information seeking (IS) found that the role of the types of information request on source selection has been little investigated compared with that of the source itself, the seeker, the seeker-source relationship and the work context. This paper describes the empirical research that was carried out in collaboration with the aerospace group of a major power systems company to understand the relationship between information searches and information requests raised by designers involved in individual design tasks. The empirical part of the research consisted of participating in a design activity undertaken within the collaborating company and in conducting analytical studies with its designers. Two large data sets were gathered using a diary study and observations with shadowing. Based on the literature review and empirical research, a framework to describe how engineering designers access information was developed. The context of an information request, the request itself and the associated search were characterised through three groups of categories. Designers were found to raise requests to acquire information and to process information. The main sources used to answer these requests were colleagues, databases and drawings. In examining how sources are used, the research confirmed that designers generally prefer to source knowledge and information through informal interactions with their colleagues and demonstrated that colleagues are more often consulted to answer the requests to process information and documentary sources to answer the requests to acquire information. The results on the use of the media to communicate with colleagues indicated that face-to-face interactions are preferred to answer the requests to process information and phone calls to answer the requests to acquire information. Overall, the research emphasises the importance of unplanned face-to-face interactions in answering complex requests. Interpersonal communication emerges as a key resource for progressing design problems in a practical way, learning how to design and establishing social networks. For researchers, this study extends the existing knowledge by proposing to analyse and interpret engineering designers' IS behaviour based on their information needs. Practitioners from current manufacturing organisations can use these findings to evaluate existing knowledge management efforts and subsequently undertake new interventions to improve the management of their knowledge and information.