Design Journals

 Get a simple Hilroy quad-ruled notebook (model 12984) to use as a design journal. They are available at the Ryerson Bookstore.


Design journals are often mandatory in many sectors/industries. There are two principal reasons for keeping a journal:


They are used in legal proceedings to verify that due diligence was shown. More importantly, they are the means by which you discharge your ethical obligations to ensure public trust in the profession of engineering.

They are incredibly useful thinking tools. By “externalizing” your thinking, you can more easily think through problems, create solutions, and analyze ideas. The research is very clear: writing on paper helps both learning and thinking clearly. And that leads to deeper understanding (and higher marks).

1971westernelectricjournal1.jpg

Fig. 2: A Western Electric journal.

1971westernelectricjournal2.jpg

Fig. 3: Note the rules printed right in the book for keeping a proper journal.

Refer to Figures 2 and 3 for examples of a real engineering design journal as produced for a large engineering firm. This particular journal dates to 1971. Modern journals are not much different, though they are generally of poorer/cheaper quality to save money.


Most importantly, you can enlarge the Figure 3 to read the notes printed right in the journal. These instructions are very typical of design journals.


Note the use of “should” in the instructions. This word - “should” - has a special meaning in engineering documents.

“Should” is used when specifying a requirement that can only be ignored if absolutely and demonstrably impossible to satisfy or irrelevant to the particular case.

These rules are, then, not just suggestions; they are to be taken as mandatory rules that can only be ignored under few and special cases.

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