Competitive Design of Web-Based Courses in Engineering Education - Web-Based Engineering Education: Critical Design and Effective Tools - page 132

their value weights V f ( t )[ TF j ], f = 1, …, d [ TF j ].
If failures are identified both in terms of cost and
technical performances, improvements are further
formulated. To perform this task properly, various
innovative problem solving tools could be also
considered (e.g. TRIZ).

the lecturers with less experience in using informa-
tion and communication technologies and tools
[12%]; BO 3 -the quality of the teaching process
not being affected because of the remote perfor-
mance [33%]; BO 4 -the operation and maintenance
costs to be acceptable [9%]; BO 5 -the return on
investment to be attractive [9%]. Values between
brackets reveal the relative ranks of the business
objectives, as they have been determined with
the AHP method.
In relation to the business objectives, the
following target-functions will be taken into ac-
count: design for easy and fast scalability [ TF 1 ],
design for cost affordability [ TF 2 ], design for
fast development and implementation [ TF 3 ], and
design for reliability [ TF 4 ]. Figure 1 reveals the
deployment process of the business objectives
into target-functions. The relationship matrix,
the correlation matrix, as well as the calculated
value weights of the target-functions are put into
evidence. According to the results in figure 1,
for this case study a special attention should be
given to design for reliability and design for cost
affordability.
For each target-function the set of require-
ments and related performance characteristics are
defined. The deployment process of requirements
into performance characteristics is revealed for
each target-function in Figures 2, 3, 4 and 5.

cASE Study

In order to exemplify the methodology, a case
study is elaborated. The application example is
referring to a web-based course about engineer-
ing design of industrial robots, which has to be
delivered to a branch X of the university Y , placed
in other locality. The course includes lectures and
project work (e.g. engineering design of a robotic
module). To keep the case study relative simple,
as well as in a reasonable paper volume, only a
limited set of target-functions and requirements
describing the target-functions will be further
considered.
Thus, in this application example, the following
business objectives have been considered to frame
the analysis and design space of the web-based
course: BO 1 -to minimize possible frustrations of
the students located in the facility X because of
less face-to-face contact with the lecturers [37%];
BO 2 -to be relative easy accepted and adopted by

Figure 1. Deployment of business objectives into target-functions