Control Engineering

Peter Welander

Generational influences on computer design
June 21, 2007

While we try not to cast stereotypes in our enlightened world, sometimes things emerge that remind us that we really aren't all the same. I speak of generational differences of computer use, which extends on an industrial scale to HMIs and monitors in control rooms.

Recently we received an e-mail from Mr. Paul M. Mrozinsky on a point that he gleaned from a column. Here's what he had to say:

"In life we, the human race, tend toward stagnation, content in not rocking the boat simply to see how far we have to push the angle of list before the boat takes on water. Only a curious child does that, we say. Well, maybe we need to experience that childish urge to do something that which challenges our imagination.

The only problem for this 55 year old electrical engineer is that there is not enough memory in most HMI's to have a water fall and jumping trout screen, let alone a Star Wars battle screen, when a process is in standby mode. The MP3 player is boring in itself, it does not have a holographic projector to put the whole story in motion. Maybe it will challenge someone to develop an addition of a holographic projector into that MP3 player."

I think one of the points Mr. Mrozinsky is trying to make is that some people, particularly younger ones, tend to expect more from computers than us 50-somethings. My wife is music minister at our church, and spends some time in the church office during the week. There is a computer there that she and other part-timers use for e-mails and the like. Recently a summer intern started, who is a mid 20-something between semesters at seminary. He has started using that computer and suddenly everything changed. The standard blue screen desktop and default icon placement was replaced with a photo from who knows where and everything rearranged to his taste. Her observation there and working with college students generally is that they can't leave any of that stuff alone. I can personally testify that my 17 year old daughter fiddles with that kind of stuff on our home computer with annoying regularity. The overriding attitude seems to be, "What else can this thing do? Let's find out."

So back to the HMI thing. How often do these issues enter into the discussion when a user is considering a system upgrade? Do questions of customizing the interface take precedence over functionality? Might a perfectly good control system be rejected because it has boring screen presentations? Am I propagating age discrimination here, or is there really something to it?

Posted by Peter Welander on June 21, 2007 | Comments (0)