Configuration

Organizing Committee Program Committee Table of Contents Preface

• Markus Stumptner (Chair). Technische Universität Wien, Austria.
• Michel Aldanondo. Ecole des Mines d'Albi Carmaux, France.
• Gerhard Friedrich. University of Klagenfurt, Austria.
• Esther Gelle. ABB Corporate Research Ltd, Switzerland.
• Timo Soininen. Helsinki University of Technology, Finland.
• Reijo Sulonen. Helsinki University of Technology, Finland.

• Michel Aldanondo, Ecole des Mines d'Albi Carmaux
• Dean T. Allemang, Synquiry Technologies Ltd.
• David Brown, Worcester Polytechnic Institute
• Boi Faltings, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology
• Gerhard Friedrich, University of Klagenfurt
• Eugene Freuder, University of New Hampshire
• Esther Gelle, ABB Corporate Research Ltd.
• Albert Haag, SAP AG
• Beat Liver, Credit Suisse Private Banking
• Daniel Mailharro, ILOG S.A.
• Hans Jørgen Skovgaard, BAAN
• Timo Soininen, Helsinki University of Technology
• Reijo Sulonen, Helsinki University of Technology
• Markus Stumptner, Technische Universität Wien

• General configurator requirements and modeling elements/ 1
  Michel Aldanondo, Guillaume Moynard, Khaled Hadj Hamou
• Handling interactivity in a constraint-based approach of configuration/ 7
  Jérôme Amilhastre, Hélène Fargier
• Dealing with Uncertainty in Design and Configuration Problems/ 13
  Eric Bensana, Taufiq Mulyanto, Gérard Verfaillie
• Preference-based Configuration of Web Page Content/ 19
  Carmel Domshlak, Samir Genaim, Ronen Brafman
• Exploiting structural abstractions for consistency based diagnosis of large configurator knowledge bases/ 23
  Alexander Felfernig, Gerhard Friedrich, Dietmar Jannach, Markus Stumptner
• Integration of Distributed Constraint-Based Configurators/ 29
  Alexander Felfernig, Gerhard Friedrich, Dietmar Jannach, Markus Zanker
• Distributed Configuration as Distributed Dynamic Constraint Satisfaction/ 35
  Alexander Felfernig, Gerhard Friedrich, Dietmar Jannach, Markus Zanker
• User Interface Requirements for Knowledge Acquisition and Modeling (short paper)/ 41
  Gerhard Fleischanderl
• Configuration of a machining operation/ 44
  Laurent Geneste, Magali Ruet, Thibaud Monteiro
• Description and Configuration of Complex Technical Products in a Virtual Store/ 50
  Diego Magro, Pietro Torasso
• Configurable Software Product Families (short paper)/ 56
  Tomi Männistö, Timo Soininen, Reijo Sulonen
• Yet Another Approach to CCSP for Configuration Problem/ 59
  Mathieu Veron, Michel Aldanondo
• Product Data Management (PDM) System Support for the Engineering Configuration Process (position paper)/ 63
  Samir Mesihovic, Johan Malmqvist
• Conceptual Modeling of Product Families in Configuration Projects/ 68
  Niels Henrik Mortensen, Bei Yu, Hans Jørgen Skovgaard, Ulf Harlou
• SAT-Based Consistency Checking of Automotive Electronic Product Data/ 74
  Carsten Sinz, Andreas Kaiser, Wolfgang Küchlin
• Unified Configuration Knowledge Representation Using Weight Constraint Rules/ 79
  Timo Soininen, Ilkka Niemelä, Juha Tiihonen, Reijo Sulonen
• Optimizing Configurations/ 85
  Tommi Syrjänen

Demo Descriptions

• IPAS: An Integrated Application Toolsuite for the Configuration of Diesel Engines/ 91
  Carlo Bach
• EngCon - A Flexible Domain-Independent Configuration Engine/ 94
  Oliver Hollmann, Thomas Wagner, Andreas Guenter

Acknowledgement: Final document preparation by Margit Rudelstorfer.

The ECAI 2000 Workshop on Configuration is the third in a series of international meetings on configuration that began with the 1996 AAAI Fall Symposium in Boston, USA, and continued with the AAAI'99 Configuration Workshop in Orlando, USA.

Configuration tasks can be defined as the design of an individual product using a set of pre-defined components or component types while taking into account a set of well-defined restrictions on how the components can be combined. This task can be supported by applying a wide range of AI techniques such as rule-based systems, constraint satisfaction and its extensions, description logics, logic programs, and different specialized problem solving methods.

Among the original application areas of the early expert systems, Configuration research has a long history, but has recently attracted a lot of research and industrial interest. The research interest is witnessed by the high turnout to events such as the AAAI'99 Workshop on Configuration. The industrial interest is indicated by the increasing number of vendors of software tools for configuration, i.e. configurators. The importance of configuration has expanded as more companies use configurators to efficiently customize their products for individual customers, and especially with the trend towards providing configuration support to the customers themselves (whether corporate or individual) via the Web.

However, efficient development and maintenance of configurators require sophisticated software development techniques. AI methods, more than ever, are central to developing powerful configuration tools and to extending the functionality of configurators. Configuration problems, like planning problems, can be seen on one hand as an interesting test-bed for novel AI techniques. On the other hand, configuration problems can serve as input for new research directions. The seventeen papers included in these pages, dealing with topics such as modeling, efficient algorithms, testify to the relevance and technical challenge presented by configuration problems.

The Organizers