Graph theory-based logic relationship programming of product development process

In order to optimize product development process, essential process improvement or process reorganizing activities are needed. Therefore, it is necessary to analyze the relationships among processes when design information is incomplete and imprecise. However, it is very difficult to program and execute the logic relationships among development processes because of the complexity, fuzziness, and dynamic uncertainty of product development processes. In this article, the relationships of product development processes and their properties are analyzed. Based on the analysis results, a novel process net is developed where the processes and the logic constraints are viewed as nodes and verges of the net, respectively. Graph theory is used as a tool to develop the process net. The method of the process net simplification for identifying the core process and its affiliated processes are also presented.