A framework to integrate design knowledge reuse and requirements management in engineering design

This paper presents a framework to integrate requirements management and design knowledge reuse. The research approach begins with a literature review in design reuse and requirements management to identify appropriate methods within each domain. A framework is proposed based on the identified requirements. The framework is then demonstrated using a case study example: vacuum pump design. Requirements are presented as a component of the integrated design knowledge framework. The proposed framework enables the application of requirements management as a dynamic process, including capture, analysis and recording of requirements. It takes account of the evolving requirements and the dynamic nature of the interaction between requirements and product structure through the various stages of product development.

Assessment of existing soakaways for reuse

This paper describes a practical approach for the investigation, assessment and design of existing soakaways. This method can be utilised for measuring the performance and capacity of the systems and examining whether the systems are suitable for reuse when information about the design and installation of the systems is not available. The requirements for field observations and the procedure for a soil infiltration test for the installed system are suggested for successful assessment. The soil infiltration rate of the system is estimated from the field test data without requiring information on the design and construction details of the system. The system's working condition is measured by a performance indicator related to the time taken to empty the soakaway. This is then employed to evaluate the potential reuse of the system. The system's drain capacity is determined by the design principles of current practice and the effect of climate change on its drain capacity is considered. Contamination of soils around the systems after long-term use of discharge service and the water present in soakaway chambers are also investigated. A detailed case study for the reuse of four installed soakaways for a new housing development demonstrates how the proposed approach provides a straightforward process for the infiltration performance and drain capacity assessment of the existing systems. The effectiveness and applicability of the proposed approach are further demonstrated from the assessments for a number of installed systems over various sites

Design process knowledge reuse challenges and issues

Product knowledge support needs are compared in two companies with different production volumes and product complexity. Knowledge support requirements identified include: function, performance data, requirements data, common parts, regulatory guidelines and layout data. A process based data driven knowledge reuse method is evaluated in light of the identified product knowledge needs. The evaluation takes place through developing a pilot case with each company. It is found that the method provides more benefit to the high complexity design domain, in which a significant amount of work takes place at the conceptual design stages, relying on a conceptual product representation. There is not such a clear value proposition in a design environment whose main challenge is layout design and the application of standard parts and features. The method supports the requirement for conceptual product representation but does not fully support a standard parts library.

Parallel dynamic graph-partitioning for unstructured meshes

A parallel method for the dynamic partitioning of unstructured meshes is described. The method introduces a new iterative optimization technique known as relative gain optimization which both balances the workload and attempts to minimize the interprocessor communications overhead. Experiments on a series of adaptively refined meshes indicate that the algorithm provides partitions of an equivalent or higher quality to static partitioners (which do not reuse the existing partition) and much more rapidly. Perhaps more importantly, the algorithm results in only a small fraction of the amount of data migration compared to the static partitioners.

Applying CBR to measure similarity of software design structures

This paper examines different ways for measuring similarity between software design models for the purpose of software reuse. Current approaches to this problem are discussed and a set of suitable similarity metrics are proposed and evaluated. Work on the optimisation of weights to increase the competence of a CBR system is presented. A graph matching algorithm and associated metrics capturing the structural similarity between UML class diagrams is presented and demonstrated through an example case.

A design pattern for integration of business process management systems

A cross-domain workflow application may be constructed using a standard reference model such as the one by the Workflow Management Coalition (WfMC) [7] but the requirements for this type of application are inherently different from one organization to another. The existing models and systems built around them meet some but not all the requirements from all the organizations involved in a collaborative process. Furthermore the requirements change over time. This makes the applications difficult to develop and distribute. Service Oriented Architecture (SOA) based approaches such as the BPET (Business Process Execution Language) intend to provide a solution but fail to address the problems sufficiently, especially in the situations where the expectations and level of skills of the users (e.g. the participants of the processes) in different organisations are likely to be different. In this paper, we discuss a design pattern that provides a novel approach towards a solution. In the solution, business users can design the applications at a high level of abstraction: the use cases and user interactions; the designs are documented and used, together with the data and events captured later that represents the user interactions with the systems, to feed an intermediate component local to the users -the IFM (InterFace Mapper) -which bridges the gaps between the users and the systems. We discuss the main issues faced in the design and prototyping. The approach alleviates the need for re-programming with the APIs to any back-end service thus easing the development and distribution of the applications

Measuring similarity of software designs using graph matching for CBR

This paper examines different ways of measuring similarity between software design models for Case Based Reasoning (CBR) to facilitate reuse of software design and code. The paper considers structural and behavioural aspects of similarity between software design models. Similarity metrics for comparing static class structures are defined and discussed. A Graph representation of UML class diagrams and corresponding similarity measures for UML class diagrams are defined. A full search graph matching algorithm for measuring structural similarity diagrams based on the identification of the Maximum Common Sub-graph (MCS) is presented. Finally, a simple evaluation of the approach is presented and discussed.

'Re-using an existing wheel' developing data architecture for cooperating autonomous and semi-autonomous, agent-based web services

This short position paper considers issues in developing Data Architecture for the Internet of Things (IoT) through the medium of an exemplar project, Domain Expertise Capture in Authoring and Development ­Environments (DECADE). A brief discussion sets the background for IoT, and the development of the ­distinction between things and computers. The paper makes a strong argument to avoid reinvention of the wheel, and to reuse approaches to distributed heterogeneous data architectures and the lessons learned from that work, and apply them to this situation. DECADE requires an autonomous recording system, ­local data storage, semi-autonomous verification model, sign-off mechanism, qualitative and ­quantitative ­analysis ­carried out when and where required through web-service architecture, based on ontology and analytic agents, with a self-maintaining ontology model. To develop this, we describe a web-service ­architecture, ­combining a distributed data warehouse, web services for analysis agents, ontology agents and a ­verification engine, with a centrally verified outcome database maintained by certifying body for qualification/­professional status.

Current status and perspectives of accelerated carbonation processes on municipal waste combustion residues

The increasing volumes of municipal solid waste produced worldwide are encouraging the development of processes to reduce the environmental impact of this waste stream. Combustion technology can facilitate volume reduction of up to 90%, with the inorganic contaminants being captured in furnace bottom ash, and fly ash/APC residues. The disposal or reuse of these residues is however governed by the potential release of constituent contaminants into the environment. Accelerated carbonation has been shown to have a potential for improving the chemical stability and leaching behaviour of both bottom ash and fly ash/APC residues. However, the efficacy of carbonation depends on whether the method of gas application is direct or indirect. Also important are the mineralogy, chemistry and physical properties of the fresh ash, the carbonation reaction conditions such as temperature, contact time, CO2 partial pressure and relative humidity. This paper reviews the main issues pertaining to the application of accelerated carbonation to municipal waste combustion residues to elucidate the potential benefits on the stabilization of such residues and for reducing CO2 emissions. In particular, the modification of ash properties that occur upon carbonation and the CO2 sequestration potential possible under different conditions are discussed. Although accelerated carbonation is a developing technology, it could be introduced in new incinerator facilities as a "finishing step" for both ash treatment and reduction of CO2 emissions.