ICADS expert design advisor: an aid to reflective thinking

摘要

An Intelligent Computer Aided Design System (ICADS) is under long-term development. Central to this work is the philosophy that the system should be a valuable assistant to the designer throughout the entire design activity. The current working ICADS prototype is a distributive system that can run with a variety of hardware processors in a Unix environment. It includes an expert design advisor that has six knowledge-based systems working as domain experts, a blackboard-coordination expert, two knowledge bases, and several sources of reference data. The expert design advisor in the prototype interprets a drawing as it is being made by a designer working in a CAD environment. It reacts in real time to monitor the evolving floorplan from the viewpoints of experts in the domains of access, climate, cost, lighting, sound and structure. The system also provides for additional interaction with the designer outside the CAD system to help in the realization of a resultant design that is free from conflicts in the six areas listed above.