Weaving an agent-based Semantic Grid for distributed collaborative manufacturing

The development and maintenance of distributed collaborative manufacturing systems is faced with increasing challenges caused by the technical difficulties and ontological issues in distributed computing, resource integration and knowledge sharing over heterogeneous computing platforms. This paper presents an agent-based Semantic Grid for distributed manufacturing collaboration across ubiquitous virtual enterprises. A hierarchy of autonomous, adaptive agents forming a ‘super peer’ based peer-to-peer network is laid out in the Semantic Grid to provide, in an open, dynamic, loosely coupled and scalable manner, the service publication, discovery and reuse for management of applications that need to utilise Grid resources. The operation and experimental evaluation of the system are presented to validate the implementation of the proposed approach.     

基于Web3D的灯饰协同设计定制系统

论文分析了目前传统的灯饰设计所存在的不足,提出了客户与设计师协同设计的可行方案,详细介绍了基于Web3D的灯饰协同设计关键技术,包括灯饰模型交互设计和同步互斥技术,开发出了一个以客户为主,以设计师为辅并基于Web3D技术的网上协同设计系统,并通过实验验证了系统的可行性。     

面向大批量定制产品的协同设计平台研究

大批量定制逐渐成为当今制造业的主流生产模式.在深入分析大批量定制产品协同设计理论的基础上,将产品协同设计和网络技术充分结合.对大批量定制产品协同设计平台进行了深入研究,给出了基于J2EE为中间件服务器的大批量定制产品协同设计平台模型。     

Flexible generic frameworks and multidisciplinary synthesis of built form

This paper presents an explanatory study of teamwork in architectural design where team members of different disciplines collaborate to achieve a coherent architectural whole. The study shows that some kind of flexible generic frameworks can be employed to sustain group dynamism through a project's lifetime. Along with our case studies, properties of teamwork-sustaining frameworks are analysed. An overview of the recent development of computer-based collaborative drawing and design support tools is given. To support more effectively the complexity and spontaneity observed in our current study of multidisciplinary collaborative architectural design, an outline of a pilot collaborative modelling environment is presented.     

Novel collaborative optimization framework with a negotiation model for satellite system design

This article proposes a novel collaborative optimization (NCO) framework that uses a persuasive multi-agent negotiation method for satellite system design. Satellite system design is a typical multi-disciplinary design optimization problem. The traditional collaborative optimization (CO) is a competitive method but has the disadvantage of inefficient convergence caused by the interdisciplinary compatibility constraints in system-level optimization. By introducing the multi-agent negotiation method, an NCO framework is proposed, in which the system-level and subsystem-level variable negotiations replace the system-level compatibility constraints in traditional CO. The negotiation introduces a modification for candidate values that do not satisfy the compatibility constraints, ensures that an alternative compatible candidate will be obtained and has high convergence efficiency. Two numerical benchmark functions and a multi-disciplinary satellite system design are used to analyse the performance of the proposed NCO. The simulation results show that NCO can efficiently ensure parameter interdisciplinary matching and advanced convergence performance.     

实时协同设计技术及其支持系统

针对实时交互型网络化协同设计过程的多主体性、协同性、灵活性、同步性等特点,分别对实时协同设计方法、图形学相关技术、实时协同交流技术等进行了详细论述,并在此基础上构建了实时协同设计平台的体系结构,重点阐述了协同浏览批注工具的设计和实现。该平台实现了以产品模型为媒介的协同设计与交流,可为网络化环境中的异地设计人员基于产品模型进行实时协同设计提供有力的支持。     

Review of semantic modelling technologies in support of virtual factory design

Comprehensive data models and standardised terminologies are required across tools and their developers to rapidly design and prototype digitised virtual factories. Also, various types of software are required to be integrated for cost-effective modelling exercises. To meet this requirement, semantic modelling technologies involving ontologies have featured prominently in many manufacturing applications. This paper considers, extensively, the current semantic requirements for digitised virtual factory design and prototyping and compares them with the capabilities of existing semantic technologies. As a result, a review of methodologies, tools and languages for creating ontologies has been reported. The review concludes with the next generation requirements for methodologies, tools and languages for creating ontologies suitable for the virtual factory design process, and further explains ongoing work associated with the creation of ontologies and reasoning mechanisms through the integrated use of ObjectLogic, OntoStudio and OntoBroker.     

SWMRD: a Semantic Web-based manufacturing resource discovery system for cross-enterprise collaboration

As supply chains are becoming ever more global and agile in the modern manufacturing era, enterprises are increasingly dependent upon the efficient and effective discovery of shared manufacturing resources provided by their partners, wherever they are. Enterprises are thus faced with increasing challenges caused by the technical difficulties and ontological issues in manufacturing interoperability and integration over heterogeneous computing platforms. This paper presents a prototype intelligent system SWMRD (Semantic Web-based manufacturing resource discovery) for distributed manufacturing collaboration across ubiquitous virtual enterprises. Ontology-based annotation to the distributed manufacturing resources via a new, multidisciplinary manufacturing ontology is proposed on the semantic web to convert resources into machine understandable knowledge, which is a prelude to the meaningful resource discovery for cross-enterprise multidisciplinary collaboration. An ontology-based multi-level knowledge retrieval model is devised to extend the traditional information retrieval approaches based on keyword search, with integrated capabilities of graph search, semantic search, fuzzy search and automated reasoning to realise the intelligent discovery of manufacturing resources, e.g. to facilitate more flexible, meaningful, accurate and automated resource discovery. A case study for intelligent discovery of manufacturing resources is used to demonstrate the practicality of the developed system.     

Managing distributed manufacturing knowledge through multi-perspective modelling for semantic web applications

The development and maintenance of semantic web (SW) means that collaborative manufacturing systems are faced with increasing challenges caused by the growing difficulty in managing distributed manufacturing knowledge. This paper presents a multi-perspective modelling approach to systematically manage distributed manufacturing knowledge on the SW. Considering knowledge engineering as a cyclic and constructive modelling process, a multi-perspective knowledge modelling process is proposed to evolve along knowledge elicitation, engineering modelling, UML-based object modelling, OWL-based ontology modelling, knowledge formalisation and OWL-QL assisted knowledge verification activities. The proposed approach is viewed as a promising knowledge management method that facilitates the implementation of computer supported cooperative work (CSCW) in distributed manufacturing for SW applications by integrating the industrial, UML enabled software engineering techniques into recent ontology-based knowledge engineering process. The feasibility of knowledge management through multi-perspective modelling is manifested using the manufacturing ontology for manufacturing electronic connectors.     

Development of a collaborative product development framework based on centre-satellite system and service-oriented architecture

To increase competitive advantage for manufacturers, collaboration product development (CPD) has recently become an important issue. Based on the CPD concept, this study focuses on the centre-satellite system (CSS) with five major roles (i.e. centre factory) and their interactions and the technology of web services using service-oriented architecture (SOA) to propose a system framework, entitled the collaborative product development framework for centre satellite system (CPDF-CSS). The CPDF-CSS comprises five modules: CF-MA module, DH-MA module, ODM-MA module, OEM-MA module, and EC-MA module. Next, based on the CPDF-CSS, a generic communication component (GCC) is designed for the interoperability among five modules under heterogeneous contexts. Finally, this study presents a case involving the motorcycle industry for evaluating the implementation of CPDF-CSS. The contributions of this study to the CPD are discussed.     

Design for manufacturing: application of collaborative multidisciplinary decision-making methodology

Design for manufacturing is often difficult for mechanical parts, since significant manufacturing knowledge is required to adjust part designs for manufacturability. The traditional trial-and-error approach usually leads to expensive iterations and compromises the quality of the final design. The authors believe the appropriate way to handle product design for manufacturing problems is not to formulate a large design problem that exhaustively incorporates design and manufacturing issues, but to separate the design and manufacturing activities and provide support for collaboration between engineering teams. In this article, the Collaborative Multidisciplinary Decision-making Methodology is used to solve a product design and manufacturing problem. First, the compromise Decision Support Problem is used as a mathematical model of each engineering teams’ design decisions and as a medium for information exchange. Second, game-theoretic principles are employed to resolve couplings or interactions between the teams’ decisions. Third, design-capability indices are used to maintain design freedom at the early stages of product realization in order to accommodate unexpected downstream design changes. A plastic robot-arm design and manufacturing scenario is presented to demonstrate the application of this methodology and its effectiveness for solving a complex design for manufacturing problem in a streamlined manner, with minimal expensive iterations.     

Distributed knowledge sharing for collaborative product development

Product development is a knowledge-intensive activity in manufacturing enterprises. This paper analyses various forms of knowledge resources in the product development process and studies the representation scheme for them. Then a novel distributed knowledge sharing model is proposed for spreading and sharing knowledge among engineers in collaborative product development teams. In a collaborative team, engineers usually come from diverse disciplines; their demands for knowledge are also different from each other. The proposed knowledge sharing model could deliver the proper knowledge to the engineers who may need them. Moreover, our model is based on the engineers’ personal knowledge repositories rather than the centralised team knowledge repository in the collaborative team. The proposed model could bring out an efficient and proactive way for knowledge sharing among engineers in the product development process. The efficiency and usability of the proposed model are validated by experiments referring to the knowledge sharing in a real-world collaborative team of a manufacturing enterprise.