USING NET-SOFTWARE IN DESIGN EDUCATION

In the early stages of the design process three major activities are involved: designing the concept, resolving the observed critical aspects and modifying the concept as a result of the previous step. This is a circular and iterative process until the final concept is ready for the detailed design phase. It is the purpose of every design method to minimize the total design time and produce well elaborated design concepts. The use of specialized software is of invaluable help in this attempt to reduce design time. A lot of different software is available on the Internet as downloadable freeware, shareware or demo versions. Most of this software has reduced capabilities; however, many software is excellent for educational purposes. We will call this software “Internet Software” or “net-software”. In this presentation two topics with respect to net-software will be discussed: 1. criteria for choosing net-software for educational purposes, and 2. the implementation of net-software in the new bachelor-master curriculum at the Higher Institute of Integrated Product Development (HIIPO) in Antwerp. A major activity in designing products is the early verification of the product concept with respect to structural, thermal and geometrical integrity. This typical verification net-software can be found in different flavours: for different applications, in different levels and with different user interfaces. Finding easy-to-use and efficient net-software is a rather straightforward task, integrating the software in the curriculum is a more difficult task. The implementation of verification net-software will be explained “in extenso” during the presentation. Two different levels of integration are discussed: basic verification for the bachelor degree and advanced verification for the master degree. It will be shown that the former approach can almost completely be reversed by using netsoftware from the early beginning of the course. This new way of teaching is completely different from the traditional way where first an extensive theoretical background is taught, supported by exercise sessions after an initial period of several weeks. In the new approach students are confronted with typical problems from the beginning of the course. They like the efficient way of treating real-life problems and the visual way of looking at the solutions. Theoretical background is now given along the course sessions as an answer to the questions evolving from the practical problems.