Provenance in Engineering
Industrial perspectives on the provenance of design data
Alex Ball
UKOLN, University of Bath
20th April 2009
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
1 / 13
Outline
1
Introduction
2
Intellectual property protection
3
Forensic investigation
4
Helpful technologies
Watermarking
Lightweight Models with Multilayered Annotations
Design Rationale Editor
Topic maps
Media Enhanced Minuting System
Asynchronous transaction activity modelling
5
Conclusions
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
2 / 13
Intellectual property protection
Information flows within an engineering organization
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
3 / 13
Forensic investigation
For effective
investigation, design
records need to be:
available
genuine
navigable
Photo courtesy: David Pritchard (CC-BY-NC)
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
4 / 13
Helpful technologies
Some relevant research from the KIM Project
Watermarking
Lightweight Models with Multilayered Annotations
Design Rational Editor
Topic maps
Media Enhanced Minuting System
Integrated product, process and rationale models
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
5 / 13
Watermarking
Csaba Salamon, Jonathan Corney & James Ritchie (2008).
‘Information Hiding through Variance of the Parametric
Orientation Underlying a B-rep Face’. In: K Solanki, K Sullivan,
U Madhow (Eds). Information Hiding. Lecture Notes in
Computer Science 5284. 268–282. DOI:
10.1007/978-3-540-88961-8_19
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
6 / 13
Lightweight Models with Multilayered
Annotations
Manjula Patel, Alexander Ball & Lian Ding. ‘Strategies for the
Curation of CAD Engineering Models’. In: 4th International
Digital Curation Conference. 1–3 December 2008, Edinburgh.
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
7 / 13
Design Rationale Editor
Rob Bracewell, Ken Wallace, Michael Moss & David Knott
(2008). ‘Capturing Design Rationale’. Computer-Aided Design
41. 173–186. DOI: 10.1016/j.cad.2008.10.005
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
8 / 13
Topic maps
Alastair Conway, Matt Giess, Andrew Lynn, Lian Ding, Yee M.
Goh, Chris McMahon, & William Ion (2008). ‘Holistic
Engineering Design: A Combined Synchronous and
Asynchronous Approach’. In: Proceedings of the 28th
Computers and Information in Engineering Conference (CIE),
ASME 2008 International Design Engineering Technical
Conference. 3–6 August 2008, New York, USA.
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
9 / 13
Media Enhanced Minuting System
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
10 / 13
Asynchronous transaction activity modelling
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
11 / 13
Conclusions
Within engineering organizations, particularly those producing
long-lived products, provenance information is needed for:
asserting authorship and ownership of particular designs
tracking the re-use of designs within organizations
ensuring the authenticity and authority of a design (or
other engineering record)
uncovering the reasons underlying any particular design
decision
⇒ not just about the files, but the hows and whys of design
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
12 / 13
Acknowledgements
UKOLN is funded by the Joint Information
Systems Committee (JISC) of the Higher and
Further Education Funding Councils, MLA: the
Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, as
well as by project funding from the JISC and the
European Union. UKOLN also receives support
from the University of Bath where it is based.
The Digital Curation Centre is supported by the
JISC and the UK e-Science Core Programme.
The KIM Project was supported by the UK
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research
Council (EPSRC) and the Economic and Social
Research Council (ESRC) under Grant Numbers
EP/C534220/1 and RES-331-27-0006.
Alex Ball (UKOLN, University of Bath)
Provenance in Engineering
20th April 2009
13 / 13