The new technology

The technology invented and developed by Configit is very different. It is based on the key notion of a virtual table.

Virtual Tabulation

The virtual table stores all legal configurations. Virtual tables may contain millions of configurations in very little storage.

In an example taken from an interactive configurator for tailor-making a bike, 127 million different combinations are stored in only six kilobytes of memory.

Configuration with virtual tabulation has two phases: an offline phase and an online phase. In the offline phase the virtual table is constructed and in the online phase it is used to provide interactive configuration as shown in the following figure.

Unique features no one else can match

Virtual tabulation keeps the benefits of dynamic search algorithms while at the same time overcomes the shortcomings. Notice that virtual tables are constructed offline, that is, a virtual table is generated once for each product model (much like with the compilation of a computer program) and can then be used repeatedly without using the product model.

Due to fundamental mathematical results about product models, it is impossible to give performance guarantees on the construction of a virtual table (for the same reason that no guarantees can be given for the dynamic search). However, when the virtual table has been generated, exact bounds can be given on the time for performing lookups. When the virtual table is used online, there is thus no uncertainty about performance.

High performance

The software for performing lookup in virtual tables is relatively simple and compact, making it possible to use it in a wide range of applications. Just as with the compact virtual tables, it is, for instance, possible to store it in small devices such as industrial controllers or cell phones.

The algorithms for virtual tabulation are based on mathematical logic. This has the important consequence that no faulty configurations will be allowed by virtual tables.