Design processes through a case study-a building transportation system

The provision of automated assistance to designers is discussed. The primary concern in design is the conceptual design phase. If the problem specification is high level and deliberately vague and the designer is prepared to consider any proposal meeting some elements of the specification, then the related design is regarded as the conceptual design. The process is facilitated by providing some mechanism to record design decisions, and on that basis to make potential design decisions more evident in the representation of designs. The author identifies these activities as structural rationalization, operational rationalization, reusability, etc. These are high-level design heuristics taking different, and often not so obvious, interpretations depending on the application. Petri nets are used as a framework for carrying out the chosen design tasks. The case study has identified a number of separate steps in the design process. Each step is motivated by a clear objective, finding a distinct expression in the representation of the design