A microcomputer database system for facilities design

A data base management system which is dedicated to plant layout type data, and should be useful to the practicing industrial engineer, is presented. The data items utilized in the data base for this microcomputer software represent only a minimal subset of the data which one would want for the creation of a proper, industrial facility design; however, they were felt to represent a good starting point for the creation of a microcomputer data base system which would aid a layout engineer. The Knowledgeman software (Micro Data Base Systems, Inc.) was used for this project; it consists of a relational database and an electronic spreadsheet. Two plant layout examples are presented to demonstrate the use of the software.