Component aggregation: A mechanism for organizing efficient engineering databases

An implementation technique for design databases is introduced. The technique is based on the component aggregation abstraction, which ignores the details of assembly structures of objects and considers assemblies which have exactly the same type of parts as equivalent assemblies. Component aggregation allows structural properties of design objects to be explored and utilized to achieve efficient organization of design data. A mathematical model of design objects is developed, and used to demonstrate the benefits of component aggregation in the execution of frequent operations in design applications.