Solutions based purely on learning technologies are viewed as insufficient to meet the various challenges facing European manufacturing. Integration within organisational and social context is required, and one strategic position, anthropocentrism, is outlined. We describe our research concerning support for the early design phase in distributed engineering settings, in particular the Extended Design History Editor. Designs can be retrieved and modified from a database of detailed design decisions and notes made using an on-line design journal (ODJ) - the electronic analogue of a designer's daybook. This enables design decisions and rationale to be recorded and examined for learning, audit, and reuse.