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Semantic hyper-graph-based knowledge

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 Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Computers in Industry
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/compind

Semantic hyper-graph-based knowledge representation architecture for T

complex product development
⁎
Zhenyong Wua, Jihua Liaob, Wenyan Songc, , Hanling Maoa, Zhenfeng Huanga, Xinxin Lia,
Hanying Maod
a
School of Mechanical Engineering, Guangxi University, Nanning 530004, China
b
LiuGong Machinery Co., Ltd, Liuzhou, Guangxi 545007, China
c
School of Economics and Management, Beihang University, Beijing 100191, China
d
College of Automotive and Transportation, Guangxi University of Science and Technology, Liuzhou, Guangxi, China

A R T I C LE I N FO A B S T R A C T

Keywords: More and more manufacturing companies are facing challenges in knowledge refining and reusing in stage of
Product development knowledge product development. To resolve this problem and make the knowledge convenient for acquisition, machine-
Knowledge representation understandable and human-understandable, this paper proposes a framework of semantic hyper-graph-based
Knowledge service knowledge representation to support the knowledge sharing for the product development. A case study of car
XML topic map
headlamp development is given to validate the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed method. The results
Ontology
bring out that it can help engineers to rapidly and accurately acquire knowledge. In future research, the
knowledge recommendation service based on product development process should be considered.

1. Introduction
Product development is an intensive knowledge involved, often
complex, fuzzy and iterative process in product lifecycle management
[1]. The needs and specifications of the knowledge is further refined
over the period of product development process [2]. An efficient
knowledge representation scheme can help the designer to make better-
informed decisions with effective computer support tools. In today’s
product development field, product developers or designers need a
large amount of raw data and information to perform their work.
Knowledge representation is very important to convert this raw data
and information into knowledge, which is available to designers [3].
There is great pressure on the product developer due to product de-
velopment risk and efficiency in managing development resources, not
just for the product but also for the development process. Furthermore,
the trend to shorten new product development time to stay competitive
has made the new methods develop fast through the use of concurrent
engineering and collaborative product development processes [4],
which depends on effective flow and share of knowledge between
product development teams [39]. There is a common view that deci-
sions made early in the design process have higher impact on product
development time, cost, and sustainability [5]. In later stages of product
development, it often requires knowledge from the earlier stages [6].
Some researches, which include design rationale systems, product fa-
milies, systems engineering, and ontology engineering, pursue to cap-
ture information or knowledge from early product development deci-
sions, customer requirements and feedback analysis reports, product
functions and associated physical features. The product development
knowledge generally exists and stores in management/application
system or engineers’ experiences [7]. Without the experience knowl-
edge of domain experts, this kind of experience knowledge cannot be
shared among engineers effectively [8].
Product development knowledge exists in technical documents,
engineering manuals, design drawings and system databases [9]. It is
mostly in structured or semi-structured form and stored in hard
memory or information system that use for knowledge sharing and
reuse [10]. In recent years, there have been significant and considerable
developments in knowledge representation in product development.
Some rule-based methods are not good for users to understand. The
graph-based methods may lack efficiency for knowledge reasoning and
storing [11]. It is useful to focus on the evolution of product develop-
ment research. Then a new knowledge representation method is pro-
posed. The knowledge representation method should be machine-un-
derstandable, human-understandable and convenient for knowledge
acquisition. Therefore, a unified knowledge representation method is
the premise of product knowledge service. Based on this, we present an

⁎
Corresponding author at: Beihang University, No.37, Xueyuan RD, Haidian District, Beijing 100191, China.
E-mail addresses: wuzhy1983@163.com (Z. Wu), ljh@liugong.com (J. Liao), songwenyan@buaa.edu.cn (W. Song), henrymhl@126.com (H. Mao), zfhuang@gxu.edu.cn (Z. Huang),
lixinx@gxu.edu.cn (X. Li), mhy2005516@sina.com (H. Mao).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compind.2018.04.008
Received 9 November 2016; Received in revised form 5 February 2018; Accepted 10 April 2018
0166-3615/ © 2018 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Z. Wu et al.
approach to achieve knowledge representation for product develop-
ment. The objective of this paper is therefore to propose a knowledge
representation architecture which utilizes semantic hyper-graph to
support the knowledge sharing throughout the product development
phase.
The remainder of this paper is structured as follows. We first provide
an overview of the general framework of the knowledge representation
method for product development. In Section 2, we give the state-of-art
review. In Section 3, we propose the classification of knowledge and
classification of knowledge representation. In Section 4, we propose the
process of our approach. We detailly discuss the structure of product
development knowledge-service platform (PDKP), i.e. the definition of
PDKP, the construction of the function and the structure of PDKP, the
ontology applied in PDKP, and how to construct the relations. We
propose an example to demonstrate how to integrate the PDKP and also
some analysis of the approach in Section 5. In Section 6, a comparison
and a discussion are provided. Furthermore, in Section 7, conclusions
and potential work are included.
2. State-of-art review
2.1. Classification of knowledge
Knowledge classification is a necessary step for knowledge re-
presentation. In the research field of knowledge management of pro-
duct development, knowledge can be classified into the following three
dimensions.
The first dimension proposed by Nonaka is that knowledge is clas-
sified into explicit knowledge and tacit knowledge. Explicit knowledge
exists in product development documents, problem-solving routines,
product function and structure description, computer algorithms,
technical and management systems, etc. [12]. Such knowledge consists
of the intellectual platform to design and manufacture the product. On
the other side, tacit knowledge is embedded in experiences, intuition,
unarticulated models or implicit rules [13].
The second dimension classifies knowledge into product knowledge
and process knowledge. Product knowledge includes product require-
ments, the mapping relationship between parts and assemblies, pro-
duct/part functions, evolution-based design rationale in the product
lifecycle. Based on the knowledge management processes and the main
stages of the product lifecycle, the product lifecycle knowledge consists
of customer knowledge, development knowledge, production knowl-
edge, delivery knowledge and service knowledge [14].
The third dimension is defined by OECD [15] which clarifies the
knowledge into four types: know-what, know-why, know-how and
know-who. This dimension is one of the most important dimensions for
the knowledge-based enterprises and organizations.
2.2. Classification of knowledge representation
Owen and Horváth [12] classify knowledge representation into five
categories: pictorial, symbolic, linguistic, virtual, and algorithmic.
Table 1
Classification of knowledge representation.
Representation category Example
Pictorial Sketches, Detailed drawings, Chart, Photographs
Symbolic Decision tables, production rules, Flowcharts, FMEA
diagram
Linguistic Customer requirements, Design rules, constraints,
Customer feedback
Virtual CAD models, virtual prototypes, multimedia,
Animations
Algorithmic Computer algorithms, Constraint solver, Design/
operational procedure
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Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56
Table 2
Classification of tacit knowledge representation.
Representation category Case
Protocol analysis Exploring problem decomposition in conceptual
design [16], engineering design processes [17]
Ethnography Role of shared artifacts [18], implementing
information systems [19]
Graphic thinking A sketch-based 3D modeling system [20], Sketch
recognition in interspersed drawings [21]
Kansei engineering Improving consumer affective satisfaction [22], User-
centric design [23]
Image scale Parameter-based product form and color design [24],
innovative product design [25]
Table 1 shows the five knowledge representation methods and some
examples respectively.
To support multi-domain knowledge sharing, [40] propose an ob-
ject-oriented knowledge representation scheme that allows both up-
stream and downstream integration of CAPP, and makes it easily
adaptable for interfacing with other computer integrated manu-
facturing modules. [41] present a causal loop model to represent causes
and effects of through-life engineering service knowledge on product
design. There are mainly five tacit knowledge representation methods,
i.e. protocol analysis, ethnography, graphic thinking, Kansei en-
gineering and image scale. Table 2 shows some representation forms
with respect to product development for tacit knowledge in product
development cycle.
The ontology approach is often used in knowledge representation.
Ontology is effective in representing the structured knowledge.
However, with the development of information technology, especially
the application of semantic technology and Web service technology,
some new methods are provided for knowledge representation.
However, the industry requires a more convenient and effective method
for the product development which involves various types of knowl-
edge.
The knowledge representation method should be able to represent
different types of knowledge resources in the product development
process. The specific knowledge classification depends on the specific
requirements of a company. However, the representation method based
on hyper-graph and ontology can describe the relationships between
knowledge resources and relationships, which can facilitate knowledge
coding and automation. The XML Topic Map proposed in this paper is
more suitable to the knowledge service environment than other
methods, which can support knowledge using and sharing. Moreover, a
well knowledge representation method will support product develop-
ment and manufacturing and improve the use of product knowledge in
new product development process.
2.3. Analysis of literature
As discussed above, the common knowledge representation methods
include that semantic network-based method, neural network-based
method, concept maps based-method, ontology based-method, se-
mantic Web-based method and topic-maps based method. Table 3
shows some previous methods. This article mainly focuses on the pro-
duct development in the manufacturing industry. The knowledge re-
presentation method requires some new features to adapt to this
manufacturing industry environment. The product development
knowledge representation model must define and represent this se-
mantics for subsequently sharing and using product development
knowledge.
According to the discussion above, the modeling method of the
product development knowledge needs considering the semantic and
syntax of the representation constructs. In order to develop such a
Z. Wu et al. Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

Table 3
The previous methods of knowledge representation.
Modeling method Researchers Contribution

Semantic networks-based method
Neural networks-based method
Concept maps based-method
Ontology based-method
Semantic Web-based method
Topic-maps based method
Woods [26] and Peters and Shrobe [27]
Widrow et al. [28] and Kasabov [29]
Sowa [30] and Novak [31]
Gómez-Pérez and Corcho [32] and Chen
[33]
Berners-Lee et al. [34] and Daconta et al.
[35]
Cañas et al. [36] and Biezunski et al.
[37]
Introduce the mechanism of this method and use the method for knowledge representation in an
intelligent environment.
Classify the application scenarios of this method. Implement a neural network-based method in
online knowledge-based learning.
Analyze knowledge of the real world and map it to a computable form.
Ontology is integrated with the semantic web. Ontology-based empirical knowledge
representation and reasoning.
Make the web context meaningful and understandable.
Apply the method in knowledge modeling and sharing environment.

model, a semantic web framework based on XML Topic Map (XTM) is
proposed. A set of hyper-graph operations on XTM is developed to re-
present the distributed knowledge resources in different product de-
velopment process. Following this model, representation architectures
are defined to for product development.
3. Classification of knowledge for product development
Explicit knowledge is well represented by formed information and
virtual reality prototypes. People have been focusing on developing
means of representing tacit knowledge. Mapping tacit knowledge to a
physical form is a very difficult problem and these mappings are not
unique. Since knowledge should be defined as information in context,
the representation of knowledge would depend on both the content and
the context of the information. A good product knowledge representa-
tion model should have the ability to not only capture knowledge
through the development process, but also reflect the relevant context.
A significant part of research in product development is concerned with
knowledge capturing, representation, and reuse.
In this paper, the knowledge of product development is classified
into four categories which consists of know-what, know-why, know-
how and know-who knowledge. Furthermore, considering the knowl-
edge user and product development process, there are three knowledge
dimensions in product development stage as shown in Fig. 1. The three
dimensions are dimension of product development knowledge, knowl-
edge users dimension and product development process dimension.
In the light of dimension of product development knowledge,
knowledge is divided into four categories in this stage: know what,
know why, know how and know who knowledge. Know-what knowl-
edge here includes customer requirements, decision tables, product
development cases and customer feedback. Know-why knowledge in-
cludes production rules, design rules, detailed drawings and fishbone
diagrams. Know-how knowledge mainly includes CAD model views,
FMEA diagram, virtual prototypes, computer algorithms and design
procedures. Know-who knowledge includes multimedia, flow charts,
and photographs.
The dimension of product development process mainly consists of
product plan, concept design, preliminary design and detail design.

Fig. 1. Classification of product development knowledge.

45
Z. Wu et al.
Fig. 2. A knowledge model of product development.
Each sub-process needs various knowledge such as know-what knowl-
edge and know-how knowledge.
The third dimension called knowledge users mainly includes two
types of user: decision maker and technology developer. The target
users of product development are persons who make decisions and
persons who conduct technology development. The persons making a
decision sometimes include product managers in the company. And the
persons conducting technology development include development en-
gineers in product development team.
4. Product development knowledge representation model
4.1. Proposed knowledge representation model for product development
The challenge of constructing such a representation model is design
a mechanism in which knowledge can be effectively captured, modeled,
represented and shared during the different development stages. The
following section presents a proposed model of product development
knowledge to be used in product development.
As shown in Fig. 2, a model of product development knowledge is
proposed, and it consists of three layers. The knowledge ontology in
ontology layer contains three objects and the detail is shown also in
Fig. 2. The mapping is created in XTM layer to link knowledge sources
and requests. The underlying layer is the knowledge resource layer
which consists of information and data.
46
Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56
The ontology layer can represent the semantic information in this
framework, which mainly consists of development process ontology,
development object ontology, and knowledge object ontology. The
process ontology generally includes the concept and property in-
formation of product development processes, such as development
stage, task, activities and some process elements. The development
object ontology mainly includes the related concepts and property of
development object, such as product ID, parts category, design versions
and attribute information. Knowledge object ontology consists of the
classification of knowledge, such as know-what, know-why, know-how,
and know-who knowledge.
The instance of product development knowledge ontology is then
designed according to hyper-graph to form the XTM layer. It represents
product development knowledge by using an instance of ontology. It
also can connect different knowledge resources which include product
objects, concepts, specifications, processes, and experts.
Resource layer stores knowledge resources refined from product
data and information.
4.2. XML Topic Map and its hyper-graph model
Topic Maps is a standard for the representation and interchange of
knowledge with an emphasis on the information finding method. A
topic map represents information using (1) Topics representing any
concept from people, countries, and organizations to software modules,
Z. Wu et al. Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

Fig. 3. Class hierarchy of XML Topic Map.

Table 4
Detail information of concepts and semantic links.
ID Class Name

t1 Concept Product lifecycle

t2 Concept Product development
t3 Concept Knowledge modeling
t4 Concept Knowledge sharing
t5 Concept Knowledge recommendation
Fig. 4. Illustration of semantic hyper-graph model. t6 Concept Product lifecycle knowledge management
l1 Semantic link Part of
l2 Semantic link Reference
l3 Semantic link Sequential
l4 Semantic link Subclass
individual files, and events, (2) Associations representing hyper-graph
relationships between topics, and (3) Occurrences representing in-
formation resources relevant to a particular topic.
These topics and associations form into a group which is called a Topic, Association, and Scope. There are three types of Topic
topic map. TopicMaps.Org produces the XML syntax for topic maps Characteristic: Base Name, Occurrence, and Role.
which is a reformulation of topic maps in XML syntax based on XLink. Generally, the topic map can be considered as a hyper-graph [38]. A
The topic map can be used as a technology for the new semantic web, in hyper-graph is the generalization of the graph concept in which an edge
which data and information are given well-defined meaning, making it is incident to an indeterminate number of vertices. There are three
possible for computers and people to use and share more effectively. distinct sets of hyper-graph elements: vertex, edge, and incidence.
XML Topic Map (XTM) term definitions are shown in Fig. 3. Every incidence in topic map links one vertex and one edge exactly. In
A Subject is anything that can be talked about or conceived by a hyper-graph concept, vertex and edge linked by incidence is called in-
human being. A Resource is a Subject that has an identity within the cident to each other. In the graph theory, the hyper-graph can also be
bounds of a computer system. Any other Subject is known as a Non- represented by a graph as follows: (1) the set of vertices is a union of all
addressable Subject. There are many types of Non-addressable Subjects. the vertices and hyper edges of the hyper-graph; (2) the set of edges
A Class is a Non-addressable Subject. Types of Resource include String, consists of all the relations of incidence among vertices and hyper edges
XML Element, XML Attribute, Topic Map, Topic Map Node and Topic of the hyper-graph.
Characteristics. Types of XML Element include < topic > Element Semantic network is a network with different types of nodes and
and < association > Element. There are three types of Topic Map Node: links that contain semantic information. For knowledge representation,

Fig. 5. Semantic network structure of knowledge.

47
Z. Wu et al.
Fig. 6. A semantic hyper-graph model of knowledge representation.
Fig. 7. Ontology model of development process.
feature, concept, and entity can be represented by the semantic node.
Semantic link can represent semantic relationships, such as subclass,
instance, and cause-effect, etc. Actually, the semantic network can also
be regarded as a specific hyper-graph. The mapping relationship be-
tween semantic network and hyper-graph can be defined and built. The
vertexes, edges, and incidences in the hyper-graph can be represented
by the semantic nodes, semantic links and links between the semantic
nodes and the semantic links. In Fig. 4, an illustration of the semantic
hyper-graph model is shown.
A detailed example of a semantic hyper-graph model is shown in
Fig. 5. The knowledge contained in Fig. 5 can be refined as follows.
Product development is one stage of product lifecycle, and a semantic
link called “part of” exists between the two concepts (i.e. product de-
velopment and product lifecycle). Knowledge modeling is the premise
of knowledge sharing. Knowledge recommendation is a subclass of
knowledge sharing. Product lifecycle knowledge management consists
of knowledge modeling, knowledge sharing and knowledge re-
commendation.
Table 4 provides detail information of concepts and semantic links.
The semantic hyper-graph model of the knowledge representation is
48
Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56
illustrated in Fig. 6. In Fig. 6, t1–t6 denote the concepts, l1–l4 denote
semantic links (l1 denotes Part of, l2 denotes Reference, l3 denotes Se-
quential and l4 denotes Subclass), and i1–i9 denote incidences.
As shown in Fig. 5, the weight values represent the importance of
semantic links. Three weight values can be obtained from the three
semantic links, that is, the link between product development and
knowledge modeling, the link between product development and knowledge
sharing, and the link between product development and knowledge re-
commendation. They are 0.3, 0.5, and 0.2 which reveals that product
development activities get more support from knowledge sharing. Based
on the semantic hyper-graph model, a data structure used for knowl-
edge representation can be designed and implemented in knowledge
sharing system.
4.3. Product development knowledge ontology
As mentioned in the previous section, product knowledge can be
divided into four kinds, i.e. know what, know why, know how and
know who knowledge. Analyzing the keystones of product devel-
opment ontology, the establishment method of knowledge ontology
Z. Wu et al. Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

Fig. 8. Development object ontology model.

Fig. 9. Development knowledge object ontology model.

Fig. 10. The four different types of knowledge ontology structure.

49
Z. Wu et al. Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

Table 5 knowledge ontology framework is divided into three parts: design

The structure of car headlamp. process ontology, design object ontology and knowledge object on-
Catalog ID Part Name tology. The development process ontology model is shown in Fig. 7.
This ontology model consists of some ontology elements as shown in
0 assembly Fig. 7.
1 sub-assembly
The development process ontology model includes some im-
1-1 lamp assembly
1-1-1 lamp
portant product design flow elements, such as Process_elements,
1-1-2 retaining ring Design_activities, Design_tasks, Participants, Design_guides and
1-1-3 gasket Guide_models. The process element consists of Output, Input, Tool
1-1-4 screw A assembly and Condition properties. These properties and sub-properties re-
1-1-4-1 screw A
present the expression form of development process ontology. The
1-1-4-2 O ring
1-1-4-3 plastic gasket object properties of development object ontology mainly include
1-1-5 screw B assembly has_output, has_input, use_tool, has_condition, roots_in, comprises, im-
1-1-5-1 screw B plements, designs and designates. The properties of each major object
1-1-5-2 adjusting blade
in the product development process also have inverse properties.
1-1-5-3 O ring
1-1-5-4 plastic gasket
The development object ontology model is shown in Fig. 8. This
1-1-6 hot pressing screw ontology model consists of some important ontology element as shown
1-1-7 nut in Fig. 8. The out parts, standard part and external cooperation part
1-1-8 locating pin assembly share a common sub-property which is the supplier. These properties
1-1-8-1 locating pin
and sub-properties represent the expression form of development object
1-1-8-2 locating pin gasket
1-2 reflector assembly ontology.
1-2-1 reflector Specifically, the model of development object ontology contains
1-2-2 ball pivot screw some product development object properties and elements including
1-2-3 dimming nut Products, Components, Output_parts, Standard_parts, External_co_parts. In
1-2-4 lighting circlip
1-2-5 tapping screw
the meantime, in order to define development object ontology, some
1-2-6 lens hood attached properties are defined and added in, such as Functions, BOM,
1-3 lens assembly Structures, Materials, Persons, and so on.
1-3-1 lens These attributes and sub-attributes represent the form of product
1-3-2 panel
development object. The main object properties in development object
1-3-3 decorative ring
1-3-4 internal lens A include has_key_compenont, has_key_part, has_supplier, has_function,
1-3-5 internal lens B has_BOM, has_structure, has_material, and own_by.
1-3-6 tapping screw The development knowledge object ontology model is shown in
1-4 hot melt glue Fig. 9. This ontology model consists of some ontology elements,
1-5 rear cover
1-6 ventilation cover
which are development process, development object and knowledge
2 Turn signal assembly object. The knowledge object property consists of four kinds of
2-1 seal ring A knowledge ontology such as know what, know why, know how and
2-2 terminal know who. These properties and sub-properties represent the ex-
2-3 seal ring B
pression form of knowledge object ontology.
2-4 turn signal holder
2-5 insulating bush The ontology model mainly includes knowledge object in pro-
2-6 insulated rubber tape duct development process. Besides product development process and
2-7 wire development object, the ontology model includes four types of
2-8 wire knowledge objects ontology, which are know-what ontology, know
2-9 sheath
2-10 locking plate
-why ontology, know-how ontology and know-who ontology. The
2-11 seal ring C property of knowledge object ontology is mainly attributed of has_a.
2-12 seal ring D The definition of the four different types of knowledge ontology
2-13 terminal structure is shown in Fig. 10.
2-14 terminal pressing plate
Fig. 10 shows the structure of know-what, know-who, know-why
3 sidelights assembly
3-1 seal ring E and know-how knowledge ontology model.
3-2 hot melt glue For the know-what knowledge ontology, these knowledge ontology
3-3 seal ring F object attributes are Person, Departments, Workgroup, Roles, Projects. The
3-4 sidelights holder relationships between objects are_owned_by, belong_to, is_related_with,
3-5 contact chip
4 bulb 12V55/60W
has_role, and has_participate_in.
5 bulb 12V21W For the know-who knowledge ontology, the object attributes mainly
6 bulb 12V5W contain Persons, Departments, Workgroup, Roles, Projects. Relationships
7 clamp between objects are is_owned_by, belong_to, is_related_with, has_role,and
has_participate_in.
For the know-why knowledge ontology, the model structure is
is presented. On this basis, taking design processes, design objects
mainly composed of Person, Resource, Roles,and Projects. The relation-
and knowledge objects as the hardcore of ontology, extracting the
ships between objects are is_owned_by, belong_to, is_related_with, be_use-
main concepts and properties from every part, the corresponding
d_rule, use_rule, and has_participate_in, has_resource.
ontology models can be formed. This structure can help to con-
For the know-how knowledge ontology, the structure includes
solidate design processes, design objects and knowledge objects
Persons, Departments, Structure, Function, Projects. The relationships be-
together, achieve the representation of four kinds of knowledge,
tween objects are is_owned_by, belong_to, is_related_with, has_function, and
and lay the foundation for the following knowledge sharing and
has_structure.
reuse.
To give a holistic view of the product development knowledge, the

50
Z. Wu et al. Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

5. Case study based knowledge representation for car headlamp development

knowledge base.
In order to test the proposed knowledge representation model of
product development, a case study based on a car headlamp has
been conducted. The headlamp is a complicated electromechanical
unit, and it is often difficult for designers to understand the pro-
blems and issues incurred during the usage of car headlamp. This
case study demonstrates how the proposed model helps to represent
knowledge required by the developers during the development
stage.

5.1. Background of case study

In the development process of automotive lamps, engineers need

a lot of knowledge; the knowledge model must be designed and
developed before knowledge retrieval reuse and sharing to product
developers. The knowledge requirement of lamp development in-
cludes (1) Dimensional requirement: In the process of lamp design,
it is divided into the important size and general size. (2) Material
requirements: Lamp parts mainly use plastic material, metal mate-
rial and rubber material; it is also a basic property for lamp de-
velopment. (3) Performance requirement: The performance of the
components is divided into mechanical properties, high-tempera-
ture resistance and corrosion resistance. (4) Assembling require-
ment: Description of the existed assembly relationships between
parts dimension and tolerance.
The lamp mainly can be divided into the assembly, sub-assembly,
turn signal assembly, sidelights assembly, bulbs and clips. The structure
of car headlamp is shown in Table 5.
Specifically, in the stage of lamp cover development, knowledge
requirements of lamp cover development mainly consists of product
development principle of lamp cover, the main function of the lamp
cover, design reliability of lamp cover, processing, structure and
appearance of the lamp cover. These kinds of knowledge are mainly
know-what and know-why knowledge. Moreover, development ex-
periences of lamp cover are mainly knowledge-how and know-who
knowledge. Selecting overall design of lamp cover, knowledge is
classified in Table 6:

5.2. Representation model for headlamp development knowledge

The prototype of headlamp development knowledge re-

presentation model is developed to support knowledge sharing and
reuse. As shown in Fig. 11, the resource layer can provide knowl-
edge resources such as a database of management/application
system, engineers’ information, the case of completed projects. In
XTM layer, the mapping between topics and relationship of them
are created to link knowledge source and request. In ontology layer,
it provides a part of know-how knowledge ontology and show some
properties reflective bowl design.

5.3. XTM syntax definition based on hyper-graph for headlamp

development knowledge

The XML Topic Maps are designed for the knowledge-intensive

automobile enterprise. It models the distributed knowledge re-
source as XML Topic Maps. In automobile manufacturing en-
terprise, the XTM knowledge management system manages knowl-
edge including topics, associations and incidences. The source of
headlamp development knowledge is composed of two parts: one
part describes the enterprise’s own information and knowledge (e.g.
product cases, product clients, competitors). The other part of in-
formation and knowledge comes from the cases. The knowledge
includes the users, products, services, rules, research report and
document, and the related internet information.
The following are some examples of the reflective bowl about XML-

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Z. Wu et al. Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

Table 6
Four types of knowledge.
Knowledge Type Name Property Process

Know-what pressure, temperature curve explicit knowledge overall design

pressure curve explicit knowledge overall design
fuzzy gradation curve explicit knowledge overall design
PVT curve explicit knowledge overall design
physical parameter explicit knowledge overall design
mechanical properties explicit knowledge overall design
FMEA explicit knowledge overall design

Know-why boundary dimension calculation formula explicit knowledge overall design

physical parameter explicit knowledge overall design
length calculation formula explicit knowledge overall design
thickness calculation formula explicit knowledge overall design
rigidity calculation formula explicit knowledge overall design
cavity amount calculation table explicit knowledge overall design
external dimension explicit knowledge overall design

Know-how working temperature rules tacit knowledge overall design

working time rule tacit knowledge overall design
pressure rule tacit knowledge overall design
transparency rule tacit knowledge overall design
dustproof rule tacit knowledge overall design
high-temperature test tacit knowledge overall design
low-temperature test tacit knowledge overall design

Know-who process parameters setting tacit knowledge overall design

selecting of materials tacit knowledge overall design
appearance feature tacit knowledge overall design
DFMEA tacit knowledge overall design
design experts tacit knowledge overall design
users explicit knowledge overall design
design engineers explicit knowledge overall design

5.4. Ontology definition for headlamp development knowledge 6. Comparisons and discussion

From the knowledge ontology definition above section, this ontology
model consists of the development process, development object and
knowledge object. Similarly, the headlamp development knowledge on-
tology property consists of four types of knowledge ontology such as know
what, know why, know how and know who. These properties and sub-
properties represent the expression form of knowledge object ontology.
As shown in Fig. 12, taking the lamp cover as development object, this
design activity belongs to the molding product design and process design.
The relationship between them is In_Part_of. The process of cooperation is
the product molding product design and mold fabrication process planning.
There are also other different kinds of knowledge, such as know-what, know-
why, know-how and know-who knowledge.
5.5. Demonstrated system
Knowledge representation method in this paper considers both the
knowledge recommendation and knowledge sharing, and it is con-
ducive to knowledge representation for product development. It can
solve the problem of inaccurate knowledge requirements of engineers,
and well describe the relationships between the knowledge resources.
According to the results of the case study, the product knowledge
system uses the proposed knowledge presentation method to organize
and share knowledge. The proposed knowledge representation method
considers semantic information integrated with hyper-graph. From the
knowledge modeling technology perspective, comparisons between the
proposed modeling technology and existed modeling technologies are
refined in Table 7.
According to Table 7, there are two advantages of the proposed
modeling technology:

An application system is developed to demonstrate the approaches
proposed in this case study. Fig. 13 is the shortcut of the main interface.
After the product developer enters the product development knowledge
service system, the developer selects the automobile root as shown in
Fig. 13. Then the developer selects the body class, and then selects the
headlamp class to learn that the headlamp has ten parts, including bulk-
head, lampstand, shield, decoration strip, lampstand cover, triangular edge,
fixture, lamp cover, inner cover and reflective bowl. Finally, the developer
selects the reflective bowl and then selects the concept stage from the drop-
down menu on top right corner, and selects the know-what knowledge type
from the drop-down menu to get the knowledge as shown in the right side
of the diagram in Fig. 13.
Fig. 14 shows the knowledge sharing process in a headlamp design. This
prototype system interface includes knowledge definition, knowledge re-
commendation, knowledge retrieval and knowledge service for the crane
design.
(1) It is a multi-level knowledge modeling structure which includes
ontology layer, XTM layer and resource layer. Additionally, the
ontology schema is also designed which includes development
process, knowledge object, development object, essential informa-
tion and relationships.
(2) The key techniques of the knowledge representation and sharing for
product development include framework and process of knowledge
capturing. These techniques are developed to achieve hyper-graph
based knowledge representation and knowledge reuse during pro-
duct development.
From the perspective of knowledge representation framework,
comparisons between the proposed knowledge representation frame-
work and others are conducted in Table 8.
According to Table 8, the features of the proposed framework are as
follows.

52
Z. Wu et al.
Fig. 11. Part of knowledge model for headlamp development.
• This proposed knowledge representation framework has strength in
knowledge reasoning and coding. The representation framework
based on hyper-graph and ontology can describe the relationship
between knowledge resources and relationships, which is con-
venient for knowledge coding and automatic reasoning.
• The framework is machine-understandable and human-under-
standable. It is convenient for knowledge capture. A unified
knowledge representation method is the premise of product
knowledge service. Especially XML Topic Map proposed in this
paper can fit in the knowledge service environment better than the
previous methods.
7. Conclusion and future perspective
7.1. Conclusion
This paper proposes a framework to represent and share product de-
velopment knowledge during the product development phase. This frame-
work first classifies the product development knowledge into four types,
know-what knowledge, know-why knowledge, know-how knowledge and
know-who knowledge. Then a knowledge representation model based on
XML topic map and ontology is proposed. A case study of knowledge re-
presentations in headlamp development shows that the proposed method
can be used to improve product development process.
The main features of the proposed framework are summarized as
follows:
53
Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56
(1) Theoretically, a semantic hyper-graph-based knowledge re-
presentation model is proposed toward product development
knowledge management, which combines the advantages of the
hyper-graph in reasoning and coding of knowledge management
and the merits of the semantic architecture model in bringing se-
mantic relationship into the representation model.
(2) In practice, the proposed framework can help design engineers to
achieve cross-department knowledge acquisition and automatic
knowledge reasoning in complex product development, because it
has strengths in effectively representing different types of knowl-
edge and describing the relationships between them. With the help
of the proposed knowledge representation model, the design en-
gineers will not have to spend a lot of time and energy to search for
knowledge as they did before in the process of complex product
development.
7.2. Future research opportunities
To further validate the proposed knowledge representation approach,
more empirical studies of different product development projects is neces-
sary to be conducted in future. Potential future research directions related to
this study is provided as follows:
Firstly, the proposed knowledge representation model based on se-
mantic hyper-graph can be integrated with engineering semantic web
technologies to support knowledge reusing and sharing among multi-
disciplinary engineers in product development. Secondly, feedback
Z. Wu et al. Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

Fig. 12. An illustration of lamp cover ontology.

Fig. 13. Illustration of knowledge service system for product development.

54
Z. Wu et al. Computers in Industry 100 (2018) 43–56

Fig. 14. Knowledge sharing in product development process.

Table 7
Comparisons from the knowledge modeling technology perspective.
Existing methods In this paper

Solution Contribution Solution Contribution

Modeling based Modeling general- Multilevel Contain ontology

on ontology oriented knowledge layer, XTM layer and
Models resource layer
Modeling based Modeling using Modeling based Add hyper-graph
on semantic semantic on hyper-graph concept in the model
association

Table 8
Comparison between the proposed knowledge framework and others.
Logicality Modularity Reasoning Understandability Coding

The framework in this paper √ Partially √ Partially √

Pictorial × × Partially √ ×
Symbolic Partially Partially √ × √
Linguistic × × Partially √ ×
Virtual Partially Partially Partially × √
Algorithmic √ Partially √ × √

Notes: “√” indicates the knowledge representation framework has the feature, while “×” denotes that the framework does not possess the feature. “Partially” denotes
that the framework partially possesses the feature.

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