James David Mcwhite

US Patent:

7818193, Oct 19, 2010

Filed:

Apr 16, 2004

Appl. No.:

10/826790

Inventors:

James David McWhite - Alexandria VA, US

Assignee:

The United States of America as represented by the Secretary of the Navy - Washington DC

International Classification:

G06F 9/44

US Classification:

705 7

Abstract:

Stowage requirements are estimated either in early stage design of a ship or in evaluation of an existing ship. Initialization data includes definition of one or more stowage aid types, definition of one or more storeroom types, description of stowage requirements associated with one or more different ship types, and enumeration of “compartment utilization factors” corresponding to each defined stowage aid type (e. g. , in the form of one or more data matrices, each matrix corresponding to a stowage aid type). Once the data setup is completed, the number of storerooms needed to hold a given or estimated volume of stowage is determined. Space layout rules and the corresponding “compartment utilization factors” are applied to each selected stowage aid type, thereby determining the number of stowage aids required (and the associated stowage aid weights) as to each stowage aid type, and/or the total storage area required as to each storeroom type.