UXDs-driven conceptual design process model for contradiction solving using CAIs

Design is situational, which means the explicit consideration of the state of the environment, the knowledge and experience of the designer, and the interaction between the designer and the environment during designing interact. When computer-aided innovation systems (CAIs) are applied to the design, the environment and the situation are different from the traditional design process and environment. The basic principles of some CAIs available in the world market are directly related to theory of inventive problem solving (TRIZ). Special TRIZ solutions, which have a few inventive principles and the related cases for contradiction problem solving, are medium-solutions to domain problems. The second stage analogy process is used to generate domain solutions and in this process, the TRIZ solutions are used as source designs of analogy-based process. Unexpected discoveries (UXDs) are the key factors to trigger designers to generate new ideas for domain solutions. The type of UXDs for the specific TRIZ solutions is studied and a UXDs-driven contradiction solving for conceptual design is formed. A case study shows the application of the process step by step. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.