Knowledge integration in early design stages for collaboration on a virtual mock up

With the intensification and the expansion of collaboration modes between designers and engineers for better time and quality mastering, the communication efficiency between these two communities of practice have to be thought taking in to account both designers and engineer´s representation systems. While designers participate to the concept research and deliver the product´s scenario of use through images, sketches and renderings, the engineers participate to the physical definition and to the materialization of these concepts. There is a need for a common representation of the concepts and the product, i.e. explicit link between the subjective data coming from the designer and the objective data materializing the product. Nevertheless semantic product characterization have specific tools and methods usually found in 2D environments and 3D CAD systems do not answer to the needs of exchanges in a multi disciplinary design team. In this paper we introduce a virtual environment to integrate, capitalize and explore knowledge around the virtual mock up in order to facilitate subjective and objective product characterization for designers and engineers collaboration. This virtual environment (MATRICS) allows the user to post multi-media annotations on a virtual 3D mock up, to support intentions transferred from the designer to the engineer when communicating. Another aspect of this environment is to provide a shared visualization of knowledge connected to the model and users interaction with knowledge representation increasing the collaboration level while designing.