Welcome to Christophe's research page

Research synopsis and areas of interest

I am a member of the SEEDS team, itself a sub-group of the AMRC group at UWE, Bristol.
My research involves the study of the different cost estimation methodologies available, identifying their limitations (may it be generally or particularly to specific customer needs) and prototyping novel solutions.
We have a strong relationship with our industrial partners who are mostly, but not limited to, aerospace manufacturing companies.
Although I acquired in depth knowledge of paramateric cost estimation, I mainly focus on generative cost estimation due to its potential in delivering more accurate estimations.
The increased accuracy is accompanied by a larger volume of output data, which led me to develop cognitive visualisation tools in order to permit a quick and thorough analysis of this data. The tools consist in a mixture of both textual and graphical approaches, providing both hypertextual and exploratory data mining solutions.

The Cost Map software (DecisionPro 4.x implementation)

CSV (Comma Separated Values) Cost Map output sample.
XML (eXtensible Markup Language) Cost Map output sample.
SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics) Cost Map output sample (for Internet browsers with SVG support).
HTML (HyperText Markup Language) Cost Map output sample (for Internet browsers without SVG support).
XML output rendered with a XSL stylesheet (frames version).
XML output rendered with a XSL stylesheet (no frames version).

The Cost Map software (Microsoft Visual Basic 6.0 application)

SVG Cost Map output sample (for Internet browsers with SVG support).
SVG Tiny Cost Map output sample (SVG Tiny is a limited SVG implementation for mobile platforms).
EMF (Microsoft Enhanced Metafile) Cost Map output sample (for office documents integration).
VCG (Visualisation of Compiler Graphs) Cost Map output sample (see links to VCG viewers in the Links section below).

XML to SVG Cost Map dynamic renderers

Using Microsoft XML Core Services (MSXML):

Using a XSLT stylesheet:

Variable nodes' size, fixed shape, with names and values labels.

DecisionPro models demonstrations (need a browser with Macromedia Flash support)

Demonstrations for other models can be requested by

Other stuff

RSS feed aimed at allowing cost engineers to trace the status of the Cost Map and hence the evolution of a product cost.
This feed can be parsed locally using my Ajax (Asynchronous JavaScript And XML) news reader based on the code described in this article.
Online Parametric Cost Estimation (PCE) models based on a XML data source parsed with Microsoft XML Core Services (MSXML): engine and bolt examples.
The SEEDS members directory is an example of how to parse a XML data source with a XSL stylesheet.
English to English translator.
Miscellaneous Javascript scripts.
Search the World Wide Web (WWW), my page, or the UWE website with Google:

World Wide Web My page UWE website

Links

SVG(T)

Carto:net, by Andreas Neumann and André M. Winter, offers a large volume of material to understand and learn SVG.
SVG - Learning By Coding, by Thomas Meinike, proposes many samples to learn SVG.
Adobe SVG Viewer is the recommended SVG plugin for Microsoft Internet Explorer based browsers. Adobe announced its discontinuation.
Corel SVG Viewer is an alternative to Adobe SVG Viewer, although its development has stopped before reaching the maturity of the Adobe plugin.
Firefox is a browser with native SVG support.
To allow displaying data in the status bar, enable the "Change status bar text" option in "Content->Advanced JavaScript settings", OR type "about:config" in the address bar and set the "dom.disable_window_status_change" flag to "false".
TinyLine is a SVG Tiny viewer for J2ME devices (e.g. Nokia Series 60).
PocketSVG, toolkit now discontinued, included a standalone viewer for Pocket PCs based on ARM/XScale, MIPS and SH3 processors.
eSVG is a free viewer for Pocket PCs based on ARM/XScale processors.
Inkscape is an Open Source vector graphics editor (recommended).
Sodipodi is a free vector-based drawing program. Inkscape is recommended over Sodipodi for the reasons listed here.

VCG

VCG information and links can be found on Georg Sander's page.
WinGraph32 is a free viewer (recommended).
aiSee is a commercial viewer (their prices page is not recommended for people with heart conditions).
The developers elected the Cost Map graph of the month for March 2006.

XML

Recommended list of DTDs by The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).
Declaring Elements and Attributes in an XML DTD by Ronald Bourret.

XSL(T)

The XSL stylesheets used to render the DecisionPro XML output in a tree are heavily based on 2MXtree by Emmanuele De Andreis.
A XSLT stylesheet can be processed dynamically in Firefox thanks to its built in TransforMiiX module, in Microsoft Internet Explorer thanks to Microsoft XML Core Services (MSXML), or locally by running a XSLT processor such as Saxon. This example by Georg Held transforms a XML data source into a SVG bar chart.

Validators

Publications

Main author

C. Bru, J. Scanlan, P. Hale (2004), "Visualization of Cost Information", International Journal of Agile Manufacturing, Volume 7, Issue 1, pp. 53-59

Main author and speaker

C. Bru, J. Scanlan, P. Hale (2002), "Visualisation of Cost Information", Proceedings of the 9th ISPE International Conference on Concurrent Engineering, Cranfield (UK), 27-31 July 2002, pp. 829-838
C. Bru, J. Scanlan, P. Hale (2003), "Generation and Cognitive Representation of Cost Information over a Network", Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Concurrent Enterprising, Espoo (Finland), 16-18 June 2003, pp. 301-309

Co-author and speaker

M. Nour, J. Scanlan, C. Bru (2000), "Modeling and Simulating Product Development Process", Proceedings of the 6th ISPE International Conference on Concurrent Engineering, Toulouse (France), 28-30 June 2000, pp. 111-118
P. Hale, J. Scanlan, T. Hill, C. Bru, A. Jocelyn, M. Round, M. Dunkley (2001), "Provision of a Web Based Decision Support System for Wing Box Tooling", Proceedings of the 7th International Conference on Concurrent Enterprising, Bremen (Germany), 27-29 June 2001, pp. 1-9
P. Hale, J. Scanlan, C. Bru (2003), "Design and Prototyping of Knowledge Management Software for Aerospace Manufacturing", Proceedings of the 10th ISPE International Conference on Concurrent Engineering, Madeira (Portugal), 26-30 July 2003, pp. 1083-1090

Co-author

J. Scanlan, T. Hill, R. Marsh, C. Bru , M. Dunkley , P. Cleevely (2002), "Cost Modelling for Aircraft Design Optimization", Journal of Engineering Design, Volume 13, Issue 3, pp. 261-269
P. Hale, J. Scanlan, C. Bru, M. Dunkley (2002), "Preliminary Findings from the DECIDE Project", Proceedings of the 9th ISPE International Conference on Concurrent Engineering, Cranfield (UK), 27-31 July 2002, pp. 839-848

Lectures

"Visualisation of Cost Data: the Cost Map software" & "Neural Networks: Application to Cost Estimation", Product Life Cycle and Cost Modelling (IGDS Bristol Consortium), 24 May 2001
"Neural Networks and Decision Trees Application to Cost Estimation", Product Life Cycle and Cost Modelling (IGDS Bristol Consortium), 24 May 2004

Contact information

Postal address:
Christophe Bru
University of the West of England
Faculty of CEMS
Dupont Building
Frenchay Campus
Coldharbour Lane
Bristol BS16 1QY
UK

Telephone:
+44 (0) 117 328 3809

Facsimile:
+44 (0) 117 328 3636

Email:

Developed by , 2005-2007. The University of the West of England, Bristol, UK.