On the radio today, I heard an interview with a guy who was talking about human factor design, which is the design of technology so it is makes sense and is easily used by human beings. Without proper human factor design, it is just technology for its own sake. Poor design is one of my pet peeves, and great design is something I really love.
The guy gave some really great examples of human factor design, both good and bad. For instance, the original Palm Pilot was not the first PDA on the market, but it was the first successful one. The designer experimented with different sized and shaped pieces of wood to get the right dimensions. Then he printed stickers with pictures of the software, and stuck them on the pieces of wood to show to people. He got their opinions about it and made changes where necessary. By prototyping the product like this, he was able to inexpensively design something that worked intuitively, and that people could feel comfortable with. 🙂
An example of bad design is the cockpit of a certain type of commercial airliner. This type of aircraft repeatedly had accidents in which the pilot would retract the landing gear after landing, causing the plane to skid on the runway on its belly. 😮 The accidents were always described as “pilot error” until someone decided to look at the controls to see what was actually happening. Turns out that the knobs for “raise flaps” and “raise landing gear” were identical, and located right beside each other. Pilots would reach down and accidentally pull the wrong knob when trying to raise the wing flaps on the plane after landing. The solution was to change the knobs on the controls. The landing gear knob was replaced by a little rubber wheel, and the flaps knob was replaced by a metal triangle. The pilot could tell, without looking down, which knob was which. This stuff is so cool. Makes me want to become a designer…
Anyway, for some interesting examples of bad design, visit this page. :nod:
yay for good designs 🙂 One of my housemate is a biological engineer..she’s learning about prosthetics (sp??) design this semester!
checked out that link..and the one about fridges – THAT DRIVES ME MAD! too many people I know have fridges with handles on both sides… it drives me BATTY! (and my friend melissa has one, and it’s even hinged on the wrong side…)
that is REALLY cool. the palm pilot example, esp, because i own 2 (and use both of them ironically enough).
so i can compare the differences in design and it is REALLY cool how the design improved.
the area of object design always facinated me. not only something has to be useful, it has to CONVINIENT and PRETTY. i mean, it really does have to have all 3 qualities to be popular.
and then of course the limitation of price.
fun field. :nod:
hey i was here first! it was empty!
yep. ease-of-use is something that more companies should pay attention to. i loved my first palm, and i wanted to get a new one, but the new ones don’t have a CF slot for my camera cards. so i can’t use it for photography. i wish i was in on the prototyping process for the new palms! 😛
i just had a deja vu about the “hinged on the wrong side” thing. i had a dream a few years ago about arguing that the fridge was not hinged on the wrong side, but that the kitchen was built backwards! i can’t believe that came back to me, and i can’t even remember what i dreamed last night!