{"id":672,"date":"2017-07-28T23:30:25","date_gmt":"2017-07-29T03:30:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/?p=672"},"modified":"2017-07-27T10:10:29","modified_gmt":"2017-07-27T14:10:29","slug":"interfaces-and-thoughts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/?p=672","title":{"rendered":"Interfaces and Thoughts"},"content":{"rendered":"

This month\u2019s column is, on the face of it, a whimsical undertaking.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be examining the man-machine interface on two different cars \u2013 a 2004 Saturn Ion and a 2000 Infiniti I30.\u00a0 Yes, you are correct!\u00a0 I own some old cars and, just in case your thoughts wander into the notion that at least there is a luxury car in the mix, please note that the Infiniti was purchased used, with over 100,000 miles on it.\u00a0 Anyway, the central theme of this post is not what kind of cars I own and drive but rather what the design of the car tells about the designer.<\/p>\n

The idea that the form and function of a work reveals a portion of the mind of the designer is old, very old, and is one of the central arguments from the medieval synthesis for the existence of God.\u00a0 I\u2019m not claiming any deep metaphysical insights from the discussion here but I do think there are interesting reflections on the human mind in this very tongue-in-cheek analysis.<\/p>\n

To start, let me say that the Infiniti is the better designed car from the point of view of acceleration, handling, and space.\u00a0 It has a V8 compared to the Ion\u2019s 4 cylinder inline.\u00a0 It has leather seats versus the Saturn\u2019s cloth ones.\u00a0 And the list could go on.\u00a0 Nonetheless, the man-machine interface in the Saturn is hands down better.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s start with the power locks on the doors.\u00a0 Here is a picture of the locking control for the I30:<\/p>\n

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and the corresponding look at the Ion:<\/p>\n

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While they are very close in design they don\u2019t work the same way at all \u2013 leading to a great deal of confusion whenever I switch.\u00a0 The icon of the black key on the white background means unlock on the Saturn and lock on the Infiniti.\u00a0 And that difference speaks to how the people who designed these controls think.<\/p>\n

I am quite aware that there are cultural differences between the Japanese and US mind but these shouldn\u2019t have come into play.\u00a0 That isn\u2019t to say that they aren\u2019t important or valid differences nor that the resulting man-machine interface isn\u2019t influenced by them but rather there should be universal agreement across both designs.<\/p>\n

The primary purpose of any key, regardless of the time and place in which it is used, is to unlock a locked door.\u00a0 In certain, older circumstances keys are also used to lock the door again but this lesser purpose should not be the one that the designers seized for their manufacturing.\u00a0 This is because, for reasons of safety and security, a car is something that is generally in a locked state unless being entered or exited.\u00a0 Once in a car, especially one that has power locks, the notion of key as the locking agent becomes almost meaningless.\u00a0 In addition, cars are imported and exported around the world and international standardizations are commonplace.\u00a0 Thus, the only possible conclusion is that the Ion gets it right and the Infiniti gets its wrong.\u00a0 This conclusion also suggests that the Infiniti designers were perhaps focused on the Japanese interpretation and not on how their product would be used in the global market.<\/p>\n

Of course, there are those of you who still object that this is simply a matter of convention; that the functional argument is not persuasive.\u00a0 I must admit that when I first encountered this difference I wasn\u2019t swayed either.\u00a0 The interface that really draws the difference and pushed my thinking from equivocation to certainty is the windshield wiper control.\u00a0 Here the problem isn\u2019t embracing a difference between conventions but a matter of internal consistency.\u00a0 And again, the Saturn is the clear winner.<\/p>\n

To be concrete, here is a photo of the interface to the wiper system from the Ion<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

and the I30<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Again, the two designs look very similar \u2013 too similar, in fact, to keep me from getting confused.\u00a0 Both designs sport the traditional iconography of a dashed line (- -) for intermittent wipers, the solid line (\u2014) for continuous low, and a heavy solid line for continuous high (\u2014<\/strong>).\u00a0 A careful examination reveals that the directions one must articulate the control is different; on the Ion, the wipers go from intermittent to low to high by pushing the lever upwards while on the I30 the same sequence results by pushing down.\u00a0 Again, the difference seems to be one of convention but we haven\u2019t discussed the intermittency setting and it is here that the I30 shows itself to be inconsistent.<\/p>\n

Before getting to the inconsistency, there is one more matter of convention that differs between the two.\u00a0 Both controls sport a dial bearing graduated lines (the white lines on the right that are wider at the top and taper to almost nothing at the bottom). that set the speed of the intermittent wipers.\u00a0 For the I30, the larger the line the larger the time gap between successive swipes by the wipers.\u00a0 For the Ion, the larger the line the smaller the time gap between successive swipes.\u00a0 So their conventions are dual to each other, with the I30 working in terms of time and the Ion in terms of frequency.<\/p>\n

The inconsistency rears its head when the lever and dial are used in tandem (i.e. when using intermittent wipers).\u00a0 In the I30, higher frequency is obtained by pushing the lever down but by turning the dial up.\u00a0 On the Ion, up means the same thing for both lever and dial.\u00a0 And that, in a nutshell, is why the man-machine interface of the Ion is better than that of the I30, despite the I30 being a better car overall.<\/p>\n

So, what do these design choices reveal about the minds of the designers.\u00a0 In the case of the Ion, it seems to show that there was one single guiding mind or principle.\u00a0 Whether you prefer the design choices of the Ion over the I30, there is no arguing that the Ion design is self-consistent.\u00a0 White icons always mean changing the state to something more active from the previously passive state.\u00a0 For the doors from locked (passive) to unlocked (active); for the wipers from off (passive) to low frequency (active) to high frequency (more active).\u00a0 In the case of the I30, the design is a hodge-podge of concepts with differing motifs and little consistency.\u00a0 This suggests that no single guiding principle that knitted the design of the man-machine interface.\u00a0 Part of this is, no doubt cultural, but part of it seems to be indicative of a company that puts pride in the subsystems but fails to put as much emphasis on knitting the systems together in a seamless whole.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This month\u2019s column is, on the face of it, a whimsical undertaking.\u00a0 I\u2019ll be examining the man-machine interface on two different cars \u2013 a 2004 Saturn Ion and a 2000… Read more ><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-672","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=672"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/672\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/aristotle2digital.blogwyrm.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}