Design Patterns for Visualization-Based Tools in Sustainable Product Design

Published

November 5, 2017

Author(s)

Deverajan Ramanujan, William Z. Bernstein, Karthik Ramani

Abstract

Most design activities involve exploring and comparing similar existing designs. Thus, adopting an eco-conscious approach in the design exploration process can aid environmentally sustainable product design (SPD). A promising approach for supporting exploration in the SPD process is through tools based on information visualization (InfoVis). The use of InfoVis for SPD allows data-driven exploration of solutions that is rapid, direct, and supports investigation of questions that the designer may not had previously identified. Previous work has demonstrated the utility of custom visualization tools for different facets of the lifecycle, such as redesign, supply chain exploration, and life cycle assessment. These tools focus on projecting sustainability-related implications back to design. However, to fully realize the potential of these data streams, future tools must synthesize these data in a manner that helps designers view the effect of making a design change on the entire downstream stages. Such integrated tools will have to work across multiple data types, visual representations, and stakeholders. In this paper we take the first steps towards addressing this challenge by formulating design patterns for visualization and interaction of product lifecycle data. These design patterns were synthesized by reviewing previous works that have successfully created visualization-based tools for SPD. We believe that our suggested design patterns will (1) serve as a guide for creating integrated visualization-based tools for SPD and (2) contribute towards reusable visual components for SPD to aid in quick interface wireframing.

Proceedings Title

Proceedings of the ASME 2017 International Design Engineering Technical Conference & Computers and
information in Engineering Conference. IDETC/CIE 2017

Conference Dates

August 6-9, 2017

Conference Location

Cleveland, OH, US

Pub Type

Conferences

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1115/DETC2017-68054

Local Download

Keywords

Sustainable Product Design, Information Visualization, Design Patterns

Citation

Ramanujan, D. , Bernstein, W. and Ramani, K. (2017), Design Patterns for Visualization-Based Tools in Sustainable Product Design, Proceedings of the ASME 2017 International Design Engineering Technical Conference & Computers and information in Engineering Conference. IDETC/CIE 2017, Cleveland, OH, US, [online], https://doi.org/10.1115/DETC2017-68054, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=922858 (Accessed April 24, 2024)