The Design Guidelines Collaborative Framework: A Design for Multi-X Method For Product Development

The Design Guidelines Collaborative Framework describes a knowledge-based ‘design for multi-X’ method, aimed at improving and assisting the work of designers, manufacturers, and inspectors in the areas of product redesign and process reconfiguration.The Design Guidelines Collaborative Framework uses the simple IDEF0 formalism to describe the DGLs-CF framework in a top-down way, in order to facilitate readers’ comprehension, and their adoption and development of the framework. Several case studies on the application of the DGLs-CF in industrial environments show the framework’s effectiveness and robustness.Industrial and academic researchers will find this book a useful guide to the DGLs-CF and mechanical engineers will be quick to appreciate the streamlined approach it describes.

Stefano Filippi is an associate professor of Design and Methods in Industrial Engineering at the Electrical, Management and Mechanical Engineering Department of the University of Udine, Italy. He received his PhD from the Polytechnic of Milan, Italy. His research is mainly focused on Knowledge-based Engineering; Knowledge-based Innovation Systems (he has co-founded APEIRON, a non-profit association focused on studying and disseminating the TRIZ theory in Italy); Rapid Prototyping in Medicine and in Cultural Heritage; and Usability. He has been developing the Design GuideLines framework since 2002, always in strong connection with industrial environments and trying to solve real problems. The usability aspects of methods and tools have always had a key role in his research topics. His research has been published in the International Journal of Production Research; Research in Engineering Design; the Journal of Oral and Maxillofacial Surgery; and the IEEE Robotics&Automation Magazine.Ilaria Cristofolini is an assistant professor in the field of Design Theory and Methodology at the Mechanical and Structural Engineering Department at the University of Trento, Italy. She received her PhD from the University of Padua, Italy. Her research areas concern Knowledge-based Design Systems; Geometric Dimensioning and Tolerancing; Standards Evolution; and Application and Verification of Geometric Tolerances. She also worked as Head of the Quality Assurance System in a firm producing sheet metal components. She participates in projects like Laser Interferometry Space Antenna, a joint mission of NASA and ESA for Fundamental Physics Studies, and Study for the Production of Exotic Species. Through her work she managed problems concerning the influence of manufacturing and verification technologies on the final quality of products, and she experienced the need for consideration of these technologies to start with the design process. Her research has been published in Research in Engineering Design; Classical and Quantum Gravity; Powder Metallurgy; the International Journal of Powder Metallurgy; and Measurement and Control.