Automation of the Design Process
The process of engineering design has changed drastically over the last fifteen years, especially as building information modeling (BIM) tools and other computerized design aids have become increasingly prevalent in the engineering industry. Engineering software vendors such as Bentley and Autodesk are bundling multiple, formerly disparate calculation and analysis functions into the same software package. However, to date there have been few documents offering a comprehensive picture of the use of design automation software by engineering firms, or offering a roadmap for firms who want to create an integrated strategy for use of design automation software.
Such a strategic roadmap would need to address the following concerns:
How to provide opportunities for junior engineers to gain the practice and intuitive insight that comes from performing many of the repetitive design functions which are now being automated
How to guard the design team from the dangers of "automation complacency" and "automation bias"
How to integrate design automation into the workflows of smaller engineering firms (also known as "small to medium enterprises" or SME's) which can't as easily afford to buy expensive software licenses.
In future posts, we will explore these concerns within the larger framework of integrating design automation software into engineering workflows.
