What is Man/Machine Interface?
The discipline of Man/Machine Interface is the study of communication between machines and humans. A machine can be anything from a wristwatch to a big factory. The communication can be the human pushing a button or the machine flashing a lamp.
You have probably often been frustrated when trying to use some apparatus, whether it's a simple thing like a payphone or a complicated thing like a new computer program: Which button should I press now? Why does it beep now? Why does it do something else than I want it to? The study of Man/Machine Interface is very useful for knowing how to design things that are easy to use. This is also called usability.
Some examples of usability problems:
-
how to design a TV so that the user can easily find the
desired channel.
-
how to design a car so that the driver can use all the
instruments without taking his/her eyes away from the traffic.
-
how to design a piece of software so that novice users can
find out how to use it without reading a big manual, and so that experienced
users don't get delayed by having to click their way through a lot of menus.
-
how to design an information system at a train station so
that passengers can easily find the right train.
-
how to design the control room of a big factory plant so
that the operator can overview all the processes and also get detailed
information about a particular process.
-
how to design a medical apparatus so that the doctor doesn't
harm the patient by accidentally pushing a wrong button.
-
how to design an apparatus so that people with various
handicaps can use it.
-
how to design an alarm system so that surveillance staff
don't get too annoyed by false alarms and don't fall asleep when there are
no alarms.
-
how to design a computer mouse so that users
don't get strain injury when using it all day.
-
how to design a toilet so that users can choose between
small flush and big flush without having to read an instruction.
Every serious company developing machines, user hardware, software, household appliances, or any other technical product used by humans should include usability considerations in their design process. Unfortunately, even the biggest and most renowned companies sometimes sell products with quite a poor and confusing user interface.
The study of Man/Machine Interface will teach you what kind of usability problems to be aware of in the design process, how to test the quality of a particular user interface, and how to improve it.
This page was last modified 2008-Dec-08