Although the human–computer interaction (HCI) community has been active for several years, very little attention has been devoted to supporting engineers. Engineers are unique computer users with particular needs. They are familiar with fields such as applied mathematics, applied sciences, simulation, project management, technical drawing, and design, as well as engineering law and economics. The nature of the engineering design process means that engineers usually operate within changing environments. Uncertainty relating to incomplete information adds to the complexity of the process especially since the engineer is legally responsible for decisions.

Managing and reusing knowledge in architecture, engineering, and construction firms can lead to greater competitive advantage, improved designs, and more effective management of constructed facilities. However, reuse often fails because knowledge is not captured; it is captured out of context, rendering it not reusable; or there are no formal mechanisms for finding and retrieving reusable knowledge. This paper presents ongoing research on design knowledge reuse that introduces the notion of knowledge in context from a corporate perspective. We argue that in order for knowledge to be reusable, the user should be able to see the rich context in which this knowledge was originally created and interact with it. We call a repository of such knowledge in context the corporate memory. We describe empirical observations of designers reusing knowledge from their personal design experiences. Based on these observations, we formalize two key activities in the process of knowledge reuse from a corporate repository: finding reusable items and understanding these items in context. We formalize six degrees of exploration that lead to understanding. We describe a prototype system, CoMem, that supports these activities. CoMem is distinguished from the document-centric state of practice solutions by its approach of “overview first, zoom and filter, and then details on demand.” In order to accomplish this approach we propose three metaphors: corporate map, fisheye lens, and storyteller. These metaphors and their implementation in CoMem are illustrated using an industry scenario.

Architects use sketching and diagramming in their design process to perform functional reasoning, formal arrangements, analogy transfer, structure mapping, and knowledge acquisition. This paper describes a research framework of the author's efforts in the studies of design drawings and the building of computational sketching tools to support the early conceptual design process in architecture. The first part of the paper discusses empirical studies conducted to determine or guess a designer's thought process from sketches and thus identifies domain-specific graphical symbols. It proposes a reasoning process framework of drawing marks, acts, and reacts. The second part of the paper illustrates how design support tools could be developed based on these concepts and describes the various applications of the study, such as indexing and retrieving of design drawings or images based on the recognition of geometric shapes and the spatial relationships among them.

Nearly all software products have rigid and predefined interfaces. Users are usually unable to modify or customize features beyond cosmetic aspects. Interface adaptability is important because aspects such as user preferences and task sequences vary widely in engineering, even within specialized domains. A methodology for the creation of adaptable user interfaces using model composition is presented in this paper. User interfaces are generated dynamically through the composition of model fragments that are stored in a fragment library. When fragments are linked to models of physical behavior, interface model composition applications are likely to be easier to extend and maintain than traditional graphical user interfaces. A prototype system within the domain of bridge diagnosis illustrates the potential for practical applications.

Poor definition and uncertainty are primary characteristics of conceptual design processes. During the initial stages of these generally human-centric activities, little knowledge pertaining to the problem at hand may be available. The degree of problem definition will depend on information available in terms of appropriate variables, constraints, and both quantitative and qualitative objectives. Typically, the problem space develops with information gained in a dynamical process in which design optimization plays a secondary role, following the establishment of a sufficiently well-defined problem domain. This paper concentrates on background human–computer interaction relating to the machine-based generation of high-quality design information that, when presented in an appropriate manner to the designer, supports a better understanding of a problem domain. Knowledge gained from such information combined with the experiential knowledge of the designer can result in a reformulation of the problem, providing increased definition and greater confidence in the machine-based representation. Conceptual design domains related to gas turbine blade cooling systems and a preliminary air frame configuration are introduced. These are utilized to illustrate the integration of interactive evolutionary strategies that support the extraction of optimal design information, its presentation to the designer, and subsequent human-based modification of the design domain based on knowledge gained from the information received. An experimental iterative designer or evolutionary search process resulting in a better understanding of the problem and improved machine-based representation of the design domain is thus established.

Engineer–computer interaction (ECI) is a new subdomain of human–computer interaction that is specifically tailored to engineers' needs. ECI uses an information classification schema, provides a modular approach to task decomposition, and integrates standard engineering characteristics and working procedures into software. A software tool kit that interprets monitoring data taken from bridges was developed according to ECI guidelines. This tool kit was given to engineers for testing and evaluation. An empirical evaluation using questionnaires was performed. The results show that this ECI software corresponds to engineers' needs and the ECI approach has potential applications to other engineering tasks.

In order to respond to the difficulties encountered by CAD software applications in really assisting the conceptual designer, we propose a tool that is capable of interpreting design sketches and feeding data to various project evaluators, right from the early phases in the design process. For that purpose, we use the concept of the absent interface, which is the only interface that is compatible with the cognitive process involved in sketching. In this paper, we present the principles of such an interface, illustrated by EsQUIsE, a software prototype for capturing and interpreting architectural sketches, which has been under development for several years.

Design consists of analyzing scenarios and proposing artifacts, obeying the initial set of requirements that lead from initial to goal state. Finding or creating alternative solutions, analyzing them, and selecting the best one are expected steps in the designer’s decision making process. Very often, not a sole designer, but a team of them is engaged in the design process, sharing their expertise and responsibility to achieve optimum projects. In a design team, most conflicts occur due to misunderstanding of one’s assessment of specifications and contexts. Decision explanations play a key role in teamwork success. Designers are rational agents trained to follow rational methods. Acceptable justifications include value function, requirements, constraints, and criteria. Generally, explanations are delivered in a multimedia fashion, composed of text, graphics and gestures, to provide the audience the ability to perceive what was contextually imagined. The more spatial the reasoning is, the richer the explanation channel should be. This paper presents CineADD, a design explanation generation model based on cinema techniques such as animation, scripting, editing, and camera movements. The idea is to provide designers with a tool for describing the way their projects should be visually explained, as in a movie. Designers develop their projects in an active design document environment. Rationale is captured as a design model, so explanations can be generated instead of retrieved. The captured design model serves as a base to visually reconstruct design, giving emphasis and guidance by using movie storytelling techniques. CineADD was implemented for the domain of oil pipeline layout showing the feasibility of this approach. We expect CineADD to become a commodity attachable to any intelligent CAD system.

The two main ways to search for information in electronic document collections are by using free-text retrieval search engines or browsing information that has been organized into predefined organizational structures. However, each of these approaches has limitations. Using word or phrase search, users are faced with a compromise between overly broad searches returning an excessive amount of information or overly narrow searches that may fail to return relevant information. Browsing organizational structures is dependent on the user's knowledge of the structures, and a user may find it difficult to refine searches. This paper introduces a user interface based approach to the browsing of hierarchically organized information entities that avoids these problems by allowing the incremental narrowing down of a set of search results and by pruning the organizational structure after each user selection to show the consequences of the selection. The effect is to present to the user at all times only that part of the organizational structure that will lead to a nonnull selection. The approach is called no zero match (NZM) browsing. The paper presents the computational basis of NZM browsing before describing a trial implementation of the approach and presenting three case studies, which represent common search situations in an engineering context.