A Blackboard-Based Architecture for Modular Product Design

Abstract

A blackboard-based architecture is developed for modular product design for the implementation of concurrent engineering. This proposed approach adopts blackboard-based techniques including blackboard, knowledge sources, agents and control module. The Workflow Automation through Agent-Based Reflective Processes (WARP) approach is used to collect the requirements and to build this model for the product development. This WARP approach entails an agent-based architecture that supports the bottom-up configuration, reconfiguration, and workflow-based services of reusable distributed design for X. Furthermore, a prototype system is created on Java, Jess and Jade platform. A specific case of bicycle part design is studied through the use of prototype system to prove the effectiveness and efficiency of the model. The blackboard-based architecture shows to take lesser time and cost in evolutionary cooperative and concurrent product design. It will greatly enhance the capability of companies to satisfy the diverse customer requirements.