“What is good about the design of the ca? Things are visible. There are good mapping, natural relationships, between the controls and the things controlled. Singe controls often have single functions. There is good feedback. The system is understandable. In general, the relationships among user’s intentions, require actions, and the results are sensible nonarbitrary, and meaningful.”I thought the article had a lot of interesting information for a couple reasons. The Initial reason is that it is proof that designers can come up with a device that can make sense to lots of people. It can have a obscene amount of different controls and options but the average person can grasp its controls. I also like how it makes me think about the concept of mapping. When you are driving a car that is all you are doing the whole time. You are using instruments together, such as the gas, brake, steering wheel and all the other controls. The first thing I do when I get in a car is start it. This requires me to push down the clutch and turn the key at the same time, the definition of mapping. Overall I thought that this article was interesting and informative.
Even though this book was written so long ago (ha-ha only 20 years) it has ideas that like Ford’s assembly line will always be influential. The ideas are so basic and important for the design of everything. Visual clues are an aspect of objects and devices throughout time. If a person can’t recognize how to perform a certain action or know how to use mapping between two different actions; then the device they are using is actually useless.
If I were to make a check list for evaluating the design of a product the first thing I question I would ask are all the commands easily seen and understandable. Then I would ask, do all the action give feedback; so that the user knows what they have done. Then I would want to know is the purpose of the device clear. Finally I would want to know if it is obvious what limitations the device has as well.