During a PhD course at SFI Norman (Trondheim) I have heard about the Danish way of thinking about product design. I was also searching for some methods or tools for product customization. I came across an interesting book by Lars Hvam , Niels Henrik Mortensen and Jesper Riis: Product Customization. However, it was not the main surprise…. the most impressive point was chapter 6: “Object-Oriented Modelling”
I had an experience about using Object Oriented thinking in design process before, but I didn’t expect to use it again in my PhD project, it was not logical to think about cultural differences and Object Oriented thinking at the same time!
This would be another step for shaping the details, I know what type of products I’m going to work on, and I know that I should select user-groups from emerging markets (yes it’s still very broad )… and now, I can say that for a feasible manufacturing in a global scale, I would work on using Object Oriented design process again, as it can be easily understoodby an Object Oriented manufacturing system. I’ll write about the advantages of Object Oriented thinking, but at the moment just remember that when you work with complex technologies and large manufacturing systems, it’s much easier to learn a common language to communicate, than learning about all of the details (like limiatrtions techniques, economica issues and etc.) in those systems. You can’t define the whole thing, sometimes there should be chance for others to modify your work, so they must be able to “read” your work.
Look at the book:
it is so nice that you kicked off such an atmosphere to share what you learnt and learn
Though I’m always afraid of isolated research documents and papers and researched, but I think your research results will be manifested in some products and that is when everything pays off.
I dont know if this object-oriented one comes from practical product to the theory or goes from theory to be applied in products? seems the first one as the examples mentioned at the beginning of the book? then the question remains if any – or to what extent – generic model could ever be applied or should?
The first example in the begining of the book is not about an Object Oriented approach. The book propose to model the whole system (manufacturing, sales etc.) by an Object Oriented paradigm. This solution is based on experiences in software engineering. My proposal is to design the product by an Object Oriented approach as well, so you can see connect your design to the system, as both of them are based on a same paradigm (Object Oriented).
maybe like the same happened in UCD that first developed from software engineering (UI)and extended to the realm of design? you know, I’ve noticed some conflicts and contradictions in UCD while practicing that to design a product and maybe that is for its different origin. I dont know if the same is true regarding OO. the way you adapting that approach does matter so much in how it’d be practical in design. That conflict happened in some areas that we wanted to have some in-tangible evaluations and results which is integrated in designing a product.
are you trying to push design into this paradigm as a part of a system or defining some independent model based on that OO?
For sure, you can adapt your tools when they have some non-design origins. After understanding the basic principles of object oriented approach, you can create a new model for product design, then you can experience it in practice (a design project) and see if it works or not!
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