Resolving non-uniqueness in design feature histories

Nearly all major commercial computer-aided design systems have adopted a feature-based design approach to solid modeling. Models are created via a sequence of operations which apply design features to incremental versions of a design model. Even surfacing, free-form surface shaping, and deformation operations are internally represented in modeling systems as features in a “history tree” that generates the final design. Much in the same manner that Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG) trees for an individual model can be non-unique, these design feature histories for solid models might be ordered in a number of ways and still result in the same final geometry and topology. We formulate this problem symbolically and present geometric reasoning techniques to generate a canonical form for certain classes of design feature histories. We define this representation as a Model Dependency Graph (MDG) and show how it can be used as a basis for developing techniques for managing databases of...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 1999
• Where: SMA
• Authors: Vincent A. Cicirello, William C. Regli
• Keywords: Design Feature Histories, Design Features, SMA 1999, Solid Modeling, Solid Models