Design Ontologies
Design Ontologies
Ontologies provide a domain with a structure for the knowledge in that domain. Domains without ontologies are constantly inventing new terms for existing knowledge and find it difficult to develop foundations on which others can build. Designing has been a domain like that. The development of the Function–Behavior–Structure (FBS) ontology has provided one robust ontology that has been applicable to both designs (the results of designing) and designing (the process of designing). References to this FBS ontology can be found in research papers in the fields of: architecture, business, civil engineering, cognitive psychology, concurrent design, design research, learning, manufacturing, mechanical engineering, parametric design, product development, product models, and software engineering.
Projects include:
situated FBS ontologies
ontologies for situated agents
ontologies of teams
ontologies in interoperability
ontologies of processes
ontology for computer-aided design
ontology for situated design optimization
ontologies and creativity
The two foundational papers are (they have received almost 4,500 citations as of 2022):
Gero, JS (1990) Design prototypes: a knowledge representation schema for design, AI Magazine 11(4): 26-36.
Gero, JS and Kannengiesser, U (2004) The situated Function-Behaviour-Structure framework, Design Studies 25(4): 373-391.
Papers that describe the research in more detail:
Gero, JS and Kannengiesser, U (2004) Modelling expertise of temporary design teams, Journal of Design Research 4(3): http://jdr.tudelft.nl/.
Gero, JS and Kannengiesser, U (2007) An ontology of situated design teams, AIEDAM 21(4): 379-391.
Gero, JS and Kannengiesser, U (2007) A Function-Behaviour-Structure ontology of processes, AIEDAM 21(3): 295-308.
Gero, JS and Kannengiesser, U (2014) The Function-Behaviour-Structure ontology of design, in Amaresh Chakrabarti and Lucienne Blessing (eds), An Anthology of Theories and Models of Design, Springer, pp. 263-283.(pdf)
Gero, JS and Milovanovic, J (2019) The situated Function-Behavior-Structure co-design model, Co-Design, doi: 10.1080/15710882.2019.1654524
Gero, JS, Tham, KW. and Lee, HS (1991) Behaviour: a link between function and structure in design, in DC Brown, H Yoshikawa and M Waldron (eds), IntCAD'91 Preprints, IFIP, Ohio, pp. 201-230.
Kannengiesser, U and Gero, JS (2019) Design thinking, fast and slow, Design Science, 5(e10), doi: 10.1017/dsj.2019.9
Kelly, N and Gero, JS (2021) Design thinking and computational thinking: A dual process model for addressing design problems, Design Science, 7, e8 doi: 10.1017/dsj.2021.7
Qian, L and Gero, JS (1996) Function-behaviour-structure paths and their role in analogy-based design, AIEDAM 10:289-312.
Tham, KW and Gero, JS (1992) PROBER-A design system based on design prototypes, in JS Gero (ed), Artificial Intelligence in Design '92, Kluwer, Dordrecht, pp. 657-676.
People
The people who have or are working with me on this include:
Bala Balachandran
Haruyuki Fujii
Jeff Kan
Udo Kannengiesser
Nick Kelly
HyunSoo Lee
Julie Milovanovic
Lena Qian
Michael Rosenman
Kwai-Wok Tham