Two opposite examples of ergonomics/usability/HCI (Week 9)
Two opposite examples of ergonomics/usability/HCI
Sometimes the best way to illustrate the value of design is through examples of bad design.
Good design most probably will go unnoticed and will stay invisible. However, if design is confusing, frustraiting or just too bad it will definitely annoy you.
It is definitely funny to see these example of bad UI, but what if poorly designed user interface and wrong usage of technology could lead into huge disasters?
The Space Shuttle Columbia Burned Up Because of PowerPoint
After a piece of debris hit the space shuttle Columbia during launch on January 16, 2003, NASA had two weeks to prepare it for re-entry. Engineers were called to assess the danger, and after reading their reports, NASA decided that everything was just fine.
So how did the experts so badly underestimate the damage to the shuttle? What did the most advanced space agency in the world decide what to do about a potentially huge disaster? These danger-assessment reports were done with the same tool a 14-year-old would use today to create a school presentation: Microsoft's PowerPoint. And, according to information design guru Professor Edward Tufte, that fact may very well have cost seven astronauts their lives.
Why? Because this was an enormously complex engineering puzzle with tons and tons of data and wasn't the kind of stuff that can be described with a pie graph and some bullet points surrounded by clip art. Trying to compress a complex problem into a PowerPoint slide inevitably leaded to unintentionally misleading information. [2]
In comparison to the previous example, where bad design resulted in a disaster, I would like to share with a brilliant example of UI that basically saves lives.
Car UI and HUD design
Like almost every piece of technology we surround ourselves with, cars are getting smarter. Manufacturers invest a lot of money to make sure our vehicles deliver the highest possible level of performance, safety, and comfort. The easiest example of the car UI that prevented an enormous amount of disasters is special camera attached to the rear of your vehicle. So called rearview camera helps you see the area behind your car when backing up. It often provides more visibility behind your car than you can get by turning your head. This added visibility can help prevent a crash when backing up.
In conclusion, I want to say that technology can save lifes and prevent disasters, whereas a wrong usage of technologies can lead to a catastrophic events.
References:
1) https://www.boredpanda.com/funny-worst-input-fields/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=organic [1]
2) https://www.cracked.com/article_19776_6-disasters-caused-by-poorly-designed-user-interfaces.html [2]
3) https://medium.com/the-futuristic-co/death-by-powerpoint-the-slide-that-killed-f3265a8d284a [3]
4) https://theultralinx.com/2014/04/17-examples-brilliant-car-ui-hud-design/ [4]
5) https://mycardoeswhat.org/deeper-learning/back-up-camera/ [5]
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