VLADIMIR HUBKA Dr.-Ing., Dr. h.c. Vladimir Hubka was born on 29th March 1924 in Police nad Metuji, Czechoslovakia, a small town near the Polish border, just north of the main road from Prague to Wroc»av. He received his initial technical education at the specialized technical high school in Pradubice, graduating in 1943. He was active in Czechoslovak industry 1943 to 1968, interrupted by political imprisonment for three years (1957-1960), where he was placed into the design department of the machine tools section for Škoda in Pilsen (1957-1960), and. During this time, in 1949, he attained his first degree of Dipl.-Ing. at the Czech Technical University („VUT), Prague. Also during his time in industry, especially as director of the projection department of ZEZ in Prague (1960-1968), Vladimir Hubka initiated discussions with his engineering colleagues towards developing a more rational approach to design engineering, and a comprehensive engineering design science (EDS). He was the first to recognize the need for an explicit theory of technical systems (TTS). Major parts of this theory consider: ! A complete abstract model for all (artificial, man-made) transformation systems, including the process, its technology, and five classes of operators, human systems, technical systems, the active and reactive environment, information systems, and management systems, all embedded in the general environment. The first draft of this model was published in 1967 [1]. ! A generalized life cycle, consisting of typically seven (classes of) transformation systems. ! Classes of properties of technical systems, separated into TS-external, TS-internal, and TSelemental design properties. TS-external are the properties that anyone can see, assess and/or measure. TS-internal are the properties related to the engineering experiential information and engineering sciences. TS-elemental are the TS-structures (function, organ and constructional), their elements and relationships, and for the elements the classes of arrangement, form, size, materials, manufacturing methods, deviations, surface quality, etc. The first draft of this model was published in 1974 [2]. Some of the terminology in English has been changed from Vladimir’s original proposals, but the basic concepts remain unchanged. In 1968, the Prague Spring took place, and as Vladimir, with his wife (Daniela) and son (Luboš), were on holiday in Denmark, they decided to remain outside Czechoslovakia. He was invited by Professor V.A. Jeppesen to take up employment as chief designer at Danmarks Tekniske Ho/ jskole (DTH), Lyngby. At the time, Mogens Myrup Andreasen was already at DTH. At DTH, Vladimir changed the orientation of the Institute for Engineering Design towards basing its teaching and research on his theories. The Institute for Engineering Design was then a first example of a fairly complete ‘school’ based on Hubka’s principles. The main topics of the Institute were in general problem-solving, product synthesis and product development. Various subsidiary theories were developed, including a theory of graphic modelling [3,4] as a basis for teaching sketching. Research topics based on the Hubka’s theories included design for assembly, design for manufacture, design for quality, man/machine interfaces, mechatronics and computerbased design support systems. In 1970, Vladimir took up residence in Zürich, Switzerland, active at the Swiss Technical
University (Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule, ETH), Zürich, appointed as head of engineering design education. Here he used his theoretical developments to successfully support his teaching. He published numerous papers in Schweizer Maschinenmarkt, Design Studies, and other journals, and in conferences. The themes of Vladimir’s theory of machine systems [2], constituted the main argument and basis for the theory of design processes (ThDesP) [5], the second major pillar of design science. Coordinated with these theories was his vision of developing and using a systematic design process in engineering practice, and suitably adapting the knowledge about technical systems to provide directly applicable information for designers. This includes defining the form of contents of areas of knowledge related (a) to the design of machine elements (the design process and the product) and (b) to design for quality. Vladimir successfully completed his Doctoral Studies in 1977 at the University for Educational Science in Klagenfurt, Austria, resulting in his thesis about engineering design education [6]. At a meeting in 1978 at his country house in Halden, Switzerland, Vladimir Hubka, together with colleagues Prof. Umberto Pighini (University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’) and M.M. Andreasen, founded WDK – Workshop Design-Konstruktion. WDK was an informal organization without formal membership, an international network of people interested in advancing knowledge about design engineering, with Dr. Hubka as its President. The initial core group of Hubka, Pighini and Andreasen also initiated the first international conference on engineering design (ICED). A series of WDK publications, including the Proceedings of the ICED conferences, resulted which were published by HEURISTA, an organization established by Dr. Hubka for the purpose. The first of these publications by Vladimir, WDK 1 [8], was a short introduction to TTS and design processes. Vladimir asked Ernst Eder in 1980 to collaborate by translating this book into English [9], preferably in time for the first ICED event – publication of the book was delayed. When Ernst moved to the Royal Military College of Canada, Kingston, Ontario, he introduced the concepts of TTS and rational design processes into the undergraduate curriculum for mechanical engineering. The relevant course is still being taught according to the course material, problems and principles based on Hubka’s concepts, as prepared by Ernst before fully retiring in 2006. M.M. Andreasen kept in close contact with Vladimir, by weekly telephone conversations and occasional visits to Zürich. Mogens successfully completed his Doctoral Studies in 1980 under F. Olsen, Lund Institute of Technology [7]. The first International Conference on Engineering Design (ICED 81 Rome) resulted in a continued series of meetings of scientists and engineers interested in design engineering and its theory and methodology. Ernst Eder was coopted onto the technical organizing committee, to substitute for Myrup Andreasen’s absence in Rome, and Ernst remained active in that capacity until the end of ICED 95 Praha. These conferences have benefitted from the intensive enthusiasm, personal guidance, and in most cases management and seed money provided by Vladimir Hubka until and including ICED 97 Tampere. They mirrored the central concerns of Dr. Hubka: design science, theory of technical systems and theory of design processes. They also
covered those related topics that provide a bridge between the theory and engineering design practice, industrial applications, design management and education. The main aim of the conferences was to provide a forum for coordinating, generalizing, discussions, making contacts and interchange of views and opinions. Before the second conference, ICED 83 København, a Workshop was held in Lyngby, Denmark, partly to prepare, review and plan the event, and partly to present short papers and discuss in a small circle matters related to design science. Such Workshops continued for the ICED until 2000. When his son, Luboš, took over the Hotel Alpina on Rigi mountain, Switzerland, around 1986,Vladimir held the annual workshop meetings there. ICED 85 Hamburg was organized by Verein Deutscher Ingenieure, the first outside a University. ICED 87 Boston, MA, USA, was the only one held outside Europe during Vladimir’s lifetime. ICED 88 Budapest was organized to attempt to break down the barriers between east and west. ICED 89 Harrogate was run by the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. It was at that conference that Stanislav Hosnedl from the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen first attended, presented a paper, and started close collaboration with Vladimir Hubka. The Department of Machine Design was redirected by Stanislav to form a complete ‘school’ based on Hubka’s principles, and has taken these principles and methods into graduate study and collaboration with industry. He has also continued to date to take part in developments of TTS, ThDesP and EDS. Several courses and workshops were given by Dr. Hubka and his associates, addressing engineering designers from industry, and educators, especially at University levels. These activities also helped to put engineering design on a more rational basis. Vladimir’s hospitality was well respected. His interests were wide, including extensive walks in the woodlands around his home at Greifensee and on Rigi, swimming, and cross-country skiing. Discussions often took place on such occasions during visits of his collaborators. Vladimir was invited to revise his theory of machine systems, and in 1984 produced TTS [10], followed by its English revision [11] in 1988. Also in 1988, a set of case studies finally reached production [12], after several revisions requested by the publisher. 1987-1989 saw a brief collaboration with Professor J.W. Schregenberger, and the first development of a morphology and map of engineering design science. A consequence was a revision of WDK 1 in 1992 [13], and the German edition of design science [14]. Meanwhile Vladimir was appointed Visiting Professor at the University of Rome ‘La Sapienza’ and other European universities, until he suffered a debilitating illness in 2004. Vladimir retired from ETH in 1990. Engineering design education was almost immediately changed to a more conventional presentation, his work at ETH was neglected. ICED 90 Dubrovnik was organized from the University of Zagreb, a second attempt to bridge the east-west divide. ICED 91 Zürich brought the series of conferences to its third origination point after Rome and Copenhagen. ICED 93 Den Haag followed.
Around 1993, Mogens Myrup Andreasen ceased to collaborate with the developments – his interest turned more towards ‘integrated product development’, and his view of transformation systems seemed to regress to a simpler model [15] that was less suited to technical systems as designed operator. He continued to attend the annual Rigi Workshops. ICED 95 Praha at last saw the east-west divide bridged. 1996 saw publication of a much expanded English version of engineering design science [16]. ICED 97 Tampere was the last in which Vladimir was the major player. ICED 99 München saw a return to Germany. Since 2000, the ICED conferences and workshops have been continued by the newly founded Design Society, of which Vladimir Hubka was declared the first honorary member at its founding meeting at the Rigi Workshop. Vladimir then started another book with Ernst Eder to explain the complex context of design engineering and its theories and methods for use in engineering practice. Dr. Stanislav Hosnedl was coopted onto the editorial panel. Dr. Hubka remained active and enthusiastic in his efforts until his first major encounter with illness in 2001. Since then, Ernst Eder has led the work on this book to extend and clarify EDS, issued in July 2007 [17]. Collaboration between Ernst and Stanislav continues to date, with some substantial improvements in understanding and definitions, e.g. [18,19,20,21,22,23]. The University of West Bohemia in Pilsen is thus at present the only active ‘school’ using the full concepts of EDS, TTS and ThDesP as its foundation. (In recognition of the world-wide contributions of Dr. Hubka and Ernst Eder, they were admitted to the degree of Doctor honoris causa of the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen in December 1994 and November 2005 respectively.)
In 2005, Vladimir Hubka and his wife moved to a very comfortable nursing home in Prçhonice, a village on the southern outskirts of Prague. From there, he entered a hospital in Prague, and after a long battle with illness, died on Sunday, October 29th, aged 82. He rests in his family grave at Police nad Metuji. The continuing series of ICED conferences and workshops has helped to cause some convergence of views and opinions, correlating research and theorizing, and transferring technology and knowledge of methods and tools. It is an international exchange showing that the various viewpoints have more in common than may be apparent, and accommodating differences which do not raise barriers. The WDK-Series of Books and Proceedings issued by Vladimir Hubka: HUBKA, V. (1980) WDK 1: Allgemeines Vorgehensmodell des Konstruierens, (in German), Goldach: Fachpresse HUBKA, V. (1987) WDK 1: Principles of Engineering Design, Zürich: Heurista, (Translated and edited by Eder, W.E., reprint, originally published (1982) by London: Butterworths) HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1981) WDK 2a: Bibliographie der Konstruktionswissenschaft (Bibliography of Design Science), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1983) WDK 2b: – Fortsetzung (– Continuation), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V., ANDREASEN, M.M., EDER, W.E., PIGHINI, U., SCHLESINGER, A. and WYSS, M. (1980) WDK 3: Fachbegriffe der wissenschaftlichen Konstruktionslehre in 6 Sprachen (Terminology of the science of design engineering in 6 languages), Zürich: Heurista
ANDREASEN, M.M.and HUBKA, V. (1981) WDK 4a: Methodisches Konstruieren von Maschinensystemen – Fallbeispiele, (Methodical Design of Machine Elements – Case Studies), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V., ANDREASEN, M.M.and EDER, W.E. (1983) WDK 4b: – Fortsetzung (– Continuation), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1981) WDK 5: Konstruktionsmethoden in Übersicht (Review of Design Methods): Proc. ICED 81 Rome, Milano: tecniche nuove HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1981) WDK 6: Konstruktionsunterricht in Übersicht (Review of Teaching Engineering Design): Proc. ICED 81 Rome, Milano: tecniche nuove HUBKA, V.and EDER, W.E. (eds.) (1981) WDK 7: Ergebnisse von ICED 81 (Results of ICED 81 Rome), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V. (ed.) (9183) WDK 8: Konstruktionsmethoden – Reading (Design Methods), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1982) WDK 9: Dietrych zum Konstruieren (Dietrych about Engineering Design), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V.and ANDREASEN, M.M. (eds.) (1983) WDK 10: CAD, Design Methods, Konstruktionsmethoden : Proc. ICED 83 København (2 vols), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1985) WDK 11: Führung im Konstruktionsprozess – Reading (Management of Engineering Design), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1985) WDK 12: Theory and Practice of Engineering Design in International Comparison: Proc. ICED 85 Hamburg (2 vols.), Zürich, Heurista EDER, W.E. (ed.) (1987) WDK 13: Proceedings of the 1987 International Conference on Engineering Design (2 vols), New York: A.S.M.E. HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1987) WDK 14: Methodisches Konstruieren der Maschinenelemente – Reading (Methodical Design of Machine Elements), Zürich: Heurista BIROLINI, A.and HUBKA, V. (eds.) (1988) WDK 15: Zuverlässigkeit technischer Systeme (Reliability of Technical Systems), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V., BARATOSSY, J.and PIGHINI, U. (eds.) (1988) WDK 16: Proceedings of ICED 88 Budapest (3 vols.), Zürich: Heurista ROOZENBURG, N.and EEKELS, J. (eds.) (1990) WDK 17: Bewerten, Entscheiden – Readings (Evaluation, Decision), Zürich: Heurista – (1989) WDK 18: Proceedings of ICED 89 Harrogate (2 vols.), London: IMechE HUBKA, V.and KOSTELIC, A. (eds.) (1990) WDK 19: Proceedings of ICED 90 Dubrovnik (4 vols.), Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1991) WDK 20: Proceedings of ICED 91 – Jubilee Congress (2 vols.), Zürich: Heurista EDER, W.E., HUBKA, V., MELEZINEK, A. and HOSNEDL, S. (1992) WDK 21: Engineering Design Education – Ausbildung der Konstrukteure – Reading, Zürich: Heurista ROOZENBURG, N.F.M. (ed.) (1993) WDK 22 – Proceedings of ICED 93 Den Haag, Zürich: Heurista HUBKA, V. (ed.) (1995) WDK 23 – Proceedings of ICED 95 Praha, Zürich: Heurista EDER, W.E. (ed.) (1996) WDK 24 – EDC – Engineering Design and Creativity – Proceedings of the Workshop EDC, Pilsen, Czech Republic, November 1995, Zürich: Heurista Note: The WDK books numbered 25, 26 and 28 were issued by the host institutions of the relevant ICED conferences. Publications of The Design Society continued this numbering scheme.
References [1] Hubka, V. (1967) ‘Der grundlegende Algorithmus für die Lösung von Konstruktionsaufgaben’ (Fundamental Algorithm for the Solution of Design Problems) in XII. Internationales Wissenschaftliches Kolloquium der Technischen Hochschule Ilmenau, Heft 12 Sektion L - Konstruktion, Ilmenau: T.H.I., p. 69-74 [2] Hubka, V. (1974) Theorie der Maschinensysteme, Berlin: Springer-Verlag [3] Tjalve, E., Andreasen, M.M. and Schmidt, F.F. (1979) Engineering Graphic Modelling, London: Butterworths [4] Tjalve, E. (1979) A Short Course in Industrial Design, London: Newnes-Butterworths [5] Hubka, V. (1976) Theorie der Konstruktionsprozesse (Theory of Design Processes), Berlin: Springer-Verlag [6] Hubka, V. (1978) Konstruktionsunterricht an Technischen Hochschulen (Design Education in Universities), Konstanz: Leuchtturm Verlag [7] Andreasen, M.M. (1980) Syntesemetoder på Systemgrundlag - Bidrag til en Konstruktionsteori (Synthesis Methods Based on Systematic Approach – Contributions to a Design Theory), Thesis, Department of Machine Design, Lund Institute of Technology, Sweden [8] Hubka, V. (1980) WDK 1 – Allgemeines Vorgehensmodell des Konstruierens (General Procedural Model of Designing), Zürich, Heurista; translated into several other languages: French , M. Wyss (1980) Zürich: Heurista; Italian, U. Pighini (1982) Marsilo ed.; Czech, S. Hosnedl (1995) Zürich: Heurista, and others [9] Hubka, V. (1982) Principles of Engineering Design, London: Butterworth Scientific, (translated and edited by W.E. Eder from [8]) [10] Hubka, V., Theorie Technischer Systeme (2 ed of [2]), Berlin: Springer-Verlag, 1984 [11] Hubka, V. and Eder, W.E. (1988) Theory of Technical Systems: A Total Concept Theory for Engineering Design, New York: Springer-Verlag (completely revised translation of [10]) [12] Hubka, V., Andreasen, M.M. and Eder, W.E. (1988) Practical Studies in Systematic Design, London: Butterworths – English edition of (1980) WDK 4 – Fallbeispiele [13] Hubka, V. and W.E. Eder (1992) Engineering Design, Zürich: Heurista (2nd edition of [9]) [14] Hubka, V. and Eder, W.E. (1992) Einführung in die Konstruktionswissenschaft (Introduction to Design Science), Berlin, Springer-Verlag [15] Andreasen, M.M. (1998) ‘Conceptual Design Capture’, in Proc. Engineering Design Conference (Design Reuse), Uxbridge, U.K. [16] Hubka, V.and Eder, W.E. (1996) Design Science: Introduction to the Needs, Scope and Organization of Engineering Design Knowledge, London: Springer-Verlag, http://deseng.ryerson.ca/DesignScience/ (completely revised edition of [14]) [17] Eder, W.E. and Hosnedl, S (2008) Design Engineering: A Manual for Enhanced Creativity, Boca Raton: CRC-Press [18] Eder, W.E. (2007) ‘Relationships Among TS-Properties, TS-Behavior and Requirements’, in Proc. AEDS 2007 Workshop, The Design Society – Special Interest Group Applied Engineering Design Science, 26-27 October 2007, Pilsen, Czech Republic, on CD-ROM [19] Hosnedl, S., Srp, Z. and Dvorak, J. (2008) ‘Cooperation of Engineering and Industrial Designers on Industrial Projects’, in Proc. 10th International Design Conference DESIGN 2008, D. Marjanovic (Ed.), FMENA, Zagreb, p. 1227-1234 [20] Eder, W.E. (2008) ‘Aspects of Analysis and Synthesis in Design Engineering’, in Proc.
CDEN 08, Halifax, N.S., 27-29 July 2008, on CD-ROM [21] Eder, W.E. (2008) ‘Requirements to Properties – Iterative Problem Solving’, in Proc. AEDS 2008 Workshop, 31 October – 1 November 2008, Pilsen - Czech Republic: University of West Bohemia, p. 49-65 [22] Eder, W.E. (2008) ‘Competency and Expertise in Design Engineering’, in Proc. AEDS 2008 Workshop, 31 October – 1 November 2008, Pilsen - Czech Republic: University of West Bohemia, p. 67-74 [23] Eder, W.E., ‘Self-Starting Graduates – An Impression of Industry’s Needs’, IJEE Vol. 24, No, 5, 2008, pp. 965-979
Compiled 1008-12-05 by: W. Ernst Eder Professor Emeritus, MSc, PEng., Dr.h.c. (University of West Bohemia in Pilsen, Czech Republic) Royal Military College of Canada, Department of Mechanical Engineering (retired) Home Address: 107 Rideau Street, Kingston, Ontario, Canada K7K 7B2 Phone: x-1-613-547-5872 E-mail:
[email protected]
