DRIVING CONCURRENCY IN A DISTRIBUTED CONCURRENT ENGINEERING PROJECT TEAM - A SPECIFICATION FOR AN ENGINEERING MODERATOR

Industry requires CAE systems of the future to be highly flexible and to provide support on multiple levels: assisting the activities both o f individual engineers and of complete product design teams. The CAE s ystem must provide accurate, consistent information to all users. It s hould also actively promote exchange of information and knowledge betw een team members. In outline an architecture for CAE systems of the fu ture is proposed, and the purpose and structure of the various element s of this architecture are discussed. In particular a specialist, supe rvisory, co-ordinator application, called the Engineering Moderator is introduced in detail, and its performance requirements specified. Thi s application addresses some fundamental requirements for provision of support for team working in a concurrent engineering environment, by encouraging and facilitating communication between team members.