Proc. of INTERNATIONAL DESIGN CONFERENCE - DESIGN 2000, pp. 407-412, Dubrovnik, May 23 - 26, 2000 TOWARDS MULTI-VIEW FUNCTIONAL KNOWLEDGE SERVER BASED ON A FUNCTIONAL ONTOLOGY Yoshinobu Kitamura, Toshio Ueda, Weiqin Chen and Riichiro Mizoguchi Keywords: conceptual design, design support, functionality, ontology Abstract: In conceptual design, a designer decomposes a required function into sub- functions, so-called functional decomposition. Our functional knowledge server is designed to provide designers alternative ways of achievement of the required function. In order to provide a wide range of alternatives, general ways of achievement are systematized based on an ontology of functional concepts. The server contains the knowledge as an is-a hierarchy and then reorganizes a decision tree suitable for the viewpoint of each designer. The server can facilitate innovative design and negotiation in a concurrent design team. 1. Introduction This research aims at developing such a knowledge base system that answers how to achieve a required function of engineering products for both human designers and computer agents. In the conceptual design methodology so called functional decomposition [Pahl and Beitz, 1988], a designer decomposes the required function into sub-functions by selecting a “way” of achievement from his/her own viewpoint. For example, a designer may decompose the required function “to connect two objects” into “to insert a screw into a hole” and “to tighten the screw” by selecting the “screw way”. The role of our system is to show the designer some alternative ways such as “hook-fit clasp” in which the objects are connected by “to hook the crook”. Manufacturing (assembling) of the product in the case of “hook-fit clasp” is easer than that of the screw way. Among the requirements for such systems, we concentrate on “wideness” of the alternatives and “adaptability” for viewpoints. The former means that the system should provide a wide range of ways of achievement in different domains. Because many inventions are based on techniques well- known in different domains [Sushkov, et al., 1995], such a system can facilitate innovative design. The latter means that the system should provide the same chunk of knowledge in the different manners suitable for the viewpoints of designers. For example, the system should show different characteristics of a way for a product designer and a manufacturing designer. Furthermore, the system should show effects of a decision from a viewpoint on that from another viewpoint. TechOptimizer [Invention Machine, 1999] is a software product based on a theory for innovative design [Sushkov, et al., 1995], which contains generic principles of invention. It, however, just searches the knowledge for given criteria and are not adaptive for the designers’ viewpoints. Moreover, its product analysis and manufacturing process analysis are independent from each other. We are tackling these issues based on Ontological Engineering [Mizoguchi and Ikeda, 1997] which aims at explication of conceptualization of a target world. We have built an ontology of functional concepts which provides a rich vocabulary for representing functionality of engineering