1.1 Introduction
Typical professional activities of engineers include sales, construction, research, development, and design. Design will be our special concern in this book. The immediate product of the design process is a report, a set of calculations, and/or a drawing that are abstractions of hardware. The subject of the design may be a process, an element or component of a larger assembly, or an entire system.
Our emphasis will be on system design, where a system is defined as a collection of components with interrelated performance. Even this definition often needs interpretation, because a large system sometimes includes subsystems. Furthermore, we shall progressively focus on thermal systems, where fluids and energy in the form of heat and work are conveyed and converted. Before adjusting this focus, however, this chapter will examine the larger picture into which the technical engineering activity blends. We shall call this larger operation an engineering undertaking, implying that engineering plays a decisive role but also dovetails with other considerations. Engineering undertakings include a wide variety of commercial and industrial enterprises as well as municipally, state, and federally sponsored projects.