**4.1 Weave structure in pattern design**

Nowadays, the range of R&D cycle for textiles is much narrowed than ever before. Moreover, it is necessary for the enterprise to afford the demand of marketing change in small quantity and large variety for the commodity (Chen, 2005). Application of computer technology in the textile field is widely spreading. For instance, computers are used for the control of processing machine in the apparel production process. Grading or marking of the cutting machine is one of the successful applications of computer technology. The computer has enhanced a lot not only the functions of the hardware but the applications of software. However, most of its applications in textile industry focus on manufacturing processes and quality improvement (Ujevic et al.,2002), . Some of them are applied to the computer aided design (CAD) systems (Rodel, 2001) (Sano, 2001) (Inui, 2001) (Luo, 2005) (Cho, 2005). In the past, the traditional drawing tools and skills were used to transform designers' ideas into

An Integration of Design and Production for Woven Fabrics Using Genetic Algorithm 43

available on the market for widely commercial applications (Denton et al., 1989) (Inui, 1994) (Pon, 1992). Until these systems became available, a considerable amount of time and money had been needed to show designers' ideas of fabric design in pattern (fabric sample) form. Probably only 15-20% of the patterns produced would have been approved for production by the sales department or the customers or both. Thus design can be a very expensive exercise for manufacturers engaged in the fancy woven fabric market. The introduction of CAD to textiles has provided a major breakthrough in multicolor weave design. With the help of CAD, designers can display, examine, and modify ideas very quickly on the color monitor before producing any real fabrics. Thus CAD allows a greater scope for free creative work on the part of designers without incurring a large cost increase. CAD allows a greater flexibility in the designer's work, and the designer's creativity is more effectively used.

However, the inspiration of a designer can do a weave structure designing, there is time for the designer to run out of his creativity for pattern design. Though the CAD is becoming more and more applicable to the pattern design, it has not yet become a complete tool to the textile designer because of limits to the function of color and material yarn selecting that can be created automatically. Up to the present, designers have got to be satisfied with a limited function of their own chosen color and material yarn recently available to display the simulation of the fabrics. Besides, due to the limits to the creative inspiration each designer has to face everyday, an intelligent design system is developed in this study to help a fabric

A piece of fabric is woven through the interlacing between the warp and weft yarn. The pattern of the woven fabric is illustrated through the layout of the different colors of the warp and weft yarn (Pon, 1992). The developed system can provide several appropriate combination sets of layout parameters that can meet the designer's satisfaction on the appearing pattern of the fabric without the need of advance lab manufacturing. With this system, a fabric designer can efficiently determine the warp (or weft) yarn color and weave structure to manufacture his satisfying fabric. Thus, the design and production division can be integrated. Furthermore, the running out of creative inspiration for a designer can thus be

Woven fabrics consist of warp and weft (filling) yarns, which are interlaced with one another according to the class of structure and the form of design desired (Hearle, 1969) (Shie, 1984) (Tsai, 1986). A concrete way of encoding textile weave is illustrated as Figure 4(B), whose weave structure is shown as. Figure 4(A). The unit of weaves was restricted to 8 by 8 for the sake of simplicity. The encoding value of '1' on the weave structure indicates 'warp float', the warp is above the weft and the encoding value of '0' indicates 'weft float', the warp is below the weft. The encoded result of a weave structure can be saved as a two-dimensional matrix and can be transformed into a bit string as a chromosome to proceed with crossover, mutation, and reproduction. After finishing the evolution, we can directly apply the obtained chromosome, i.e., bit string result ('1' denotes warp float, '0' denotes weft float) to plot the weave structure. The color of warp and weft yarn is encoded with 4 bits. There are totally 16 (= 24) kinds of color for each

designer with the creative weave structure design.

eliminated through the assistance of this developed system.

**4.2 Encoding** 

warp or weft yarn.


Population:30, chromosome 16 bits, generation 10, crossover rate 0.6, mutation rate 0.033, N1 840 yds/lb, N2 840 yds/lb, n1 ends/in, n2 picks/in

Table 4. Result of the tenth generation (Lin, 2003)

concrete works. Due to the limitations above, a fabric design could not proceed more easily and effectively. Plenty of time was wasted on repeated paper drawing of the same types of different materials' colors and patterns. Besides, the different color combinations' outlooks of warp and weft yarn for a piece of fabric could only be obtained through a designer's imagination. Now, a simulation system (Ujevic, 2002) for color matching has already been put to practical use. The user of this system can confirm color matching of yarns by changing colors or patterns of weave structure displayed on the computer monitor of a computer with the system.

Therefore, the application of CAD to simulated woven-fabric appearance has been a major interesting research in recent years and various hardware and software systems are now available on the market for widely commercial applications (Denton et al., 1989) (Inui, 1994) (Pon, 1992). Until these systems became available, a considerable amount of time and money had been needed to show designers' ideas of fabric design in pattern (fabric sample) form. Probably only 15-20% of the patterns produced would have been approved for production by the sales department or the customers or both. Thus design can be a very expensive exercise for manufacturers engaged in the fancy woven fabric market. The introduction of CAD to textiles has provided a major breakthrough in multicolor weave design. With the help of CAD, designers can display, examine, and modify ideas very quickly on the color monitor before producing any real fabrics. Thus CAD allows a greater scope for free creative work on the part of designers without incurring a large cost increase. CAD allows a greater flexibility in the designer's work, and the designer's creativity is more effectively used.

However, the inspiration of a designer can do a weave structure designing, there is time for the designer to run out of his creativity for pattern design. Though the CAD is becoming more and more applicable to the pattern design, it has not yet become a complete tool to the textile designer because of limits to the function of color and material yarn selecting that can be created automatically. Up to the present, designers have got to be satisfied with a limited function of their own chosen color and material yarn recently available to display the simulation of the fabrics. Besides, due to the limits to the creative inspiration each designer has to face everyday, an intelligent design system is developed in this study to help a fabric designer with the creative weave structure design.

A piece of fabric is woven through the interlacing between the warp and weft yarn. The pattern of the woven fabric is illustrated through the layout of the different colors of the warp and weft yarn (Pon, 1992). The developed system can provide several appropriate combination sets of layout parameters that can meet the designer's satisfaction on the appearing pattern of the fabric without the need of advance lab manufacturing. With this system, a fabric designer can efficiently determine the warp (or weft) yarn color and weave structure to manufacture his satisfying fabric. Thus, the design and production division can be integrated. Furthermore, the running out of creative inspiration for a designer can thus be eliminated through the assistance of this developed system.
