Manu Vedapudi

US Patent:

56468628, Jul 8, 1997

Filed:

Sep 29, 1994

Appl. No.:

8/315163

Inventors:

Jennifer Anne Jones Jolliffe - Franklin MI
Manu Vedapudi - Canton MI
Shaun Stephen Devlin - Bloomfield Hills MI
Robert Jay Louch - Walled Lake MI

Assignee:

Ford Motor Company - Dearborn MI

International Classification:

B60R 1600

US Classification:

364488

Abstract:

An integrated Vehicle Electrical Design and analysis System (VEDS) which is adapted to accommodate data interchanged between multiple vendor-independent Computer Aided Engineering (CAE) tools. The system includes a Vehicle Database (VDB) which is operative as a central repository to store all design, analysis and library information. The VDB is interfaced and data is exchanged with the CAE tools through an interface which is predominantly object-oriented using Common Lisp Object System (CLOS). For each tool, an outbound translator is operative to translate the tool's internal data structures into a standard interchange format. Similarly, for each tool, an inbound translator is operative to translate a standard or tool specific interchange format into the tool's internal data structures. The VDB also includes an inbound and an outbound translator. The inbound translator is operative to load data structures from each of the CAE tools into the VDB.