What is design?

2006-11-13T14:10:00.001-08:00

A Google search resulted the following:
Design is a purposeful, systematic, and creative activity.

Nice small definition indeed. But it does not say anything about the components of design. In fact this definition is too general to apply to mechanical engineering design (MED). I would rather say that, mechanical engineering design is the creation of product which is analyzed to work correctly, cost effective to manufacture and easy to maintain.

This definition may not encompass all the aspects of MED but it surely does reflect the major requirements a designer should keep in mind while designing a product.

Requirements Engineering in Mechanical Design

2006-11-06T12:06:00.000-08:00

The main task of engineers is to apply their scientific and engineering knowledge to the solution of technical problems, and then to optimize those solutions within the requirements and constraints set by material, technology, economic, legal, environmental and human-related considerations. In many cases design can be considered as the optimization of given objectives within partly conflicting constraints. Requirements change with time, so that a particular solution can only be optimized for a particular set of circumstances.

Requirement extraction or generation for mechanical design can be a tedious task. It involves incorporation of geometry, kinematics, transfer forces, material information etc. into a single scope.

Engineering Design

What is design?

Requirements Engineering in Mechanical Design