THE 121 HEURISTICS FOR PROBLEM SOLVING

Authors:
MARCO AURÉLIO DE CARVALHO, TZ-CHIN WEI and SEMYON D. SAVRANSKY

Publisher: RO-INI, 2003, 287 pages; Acrobat pdf file about 1.6Mb

Creative solutions to problems are easily recognizable, after they have been created. But how to attain them?

This book is about a promising approach to creative problem solving - the use of heuristics. The main purpose of an heuristic is to make problem solving more efficient, by making past experience - which could guide the generation of solutions for new problems - promptly available.

The heuristic approach is widely used in TRIZ - actually more than 60% of problems can be solved with the heuristics.

With this book, the reader will be able to:
· Discover for him(her)self 121 Heuristics for problem solving thus far uncovered in TRIZ;
· Understand the 121 Heuristics, both from their descriptions and from 500+ examples selected carefully out of the worldwide patent databases;
· Find how 121 Heuristics are related with the Altshuller's Inventive Principles;
· Find the more promising heuristic(s) and then the solution of his/her problems.

PREFACE

1 - INTRODUCTION
1.1 - Project goals
1.2 - The Role of Heuristics and Their Examples
1.3 - Why Another Set of Heuristics in TRIZ?

2 - POLOVINKIN'S HEURISTICS
2.1 - Background
2.2 - The 121 Heuristic Expedients for Systems Transformations

3 - HOW TO SEARCH FOR EXAMPLES?

4 - SEARCH RESULTS
4.1 - Tabulation of Results
4.2 - Evaluation of Results

5 - COMPARISON OF 121H WITH INVENTIVE PRINCIPLES
5.1 - Background
5.2 - Comparison results
5.2.1 - Inventive Principles Perspective
5.2.2 - Polovinkin’s Heuristics Perspective
5.2.3 - Cross-reference of 121H and Inventive Principles
5.3 - Final Remarks

6 - CONCLUSION

7 - REFERENCES

APPENDIX 1: EXAMPLES FOR THE 121H
APPENDIX 2: INVENTIVE PRINCIPLES