An I-Ching-TRIZ-Inspired Approach to Design Concept Generation

This paper presents a new approach to producing innovative design concepts. The proposed approach involves extending the inventive principles of TRIZ by integrating other TRIZ and TRIZ-inspired tools. The set of inventive principles is then structured according to a framework adapted from I-Ching and represented using TRIZ’s Behaviour-Entity (BE) formalism to which constraints have also been added. The adoption of the BE representation enables a reduction in the amount of repeated information in the inventive principles. A BE pair contains information on a design solution. A Behaviour-Entity-Constraint (BEC) triple additionally has information on constraints on the solution. The BEC representation thus facilitates the retrieval and generation of design solutions from design specifications. The paper uses the problem of laying out seats in an aircraft cabin to illustrate advantages of the proposed approach.