> If you approach software design the way experts in commercial and military cockpit human factors approach their craft, you will end up with designs that are fast, familiar, and forgiving. Such designs would be a refreshing change in the ghastly world of PC software. They'd be a refreshing change in the world of general aviation, too.
This completely ignores hundreds or even thousands of required flight hours. If I required my users to train for hundreds of hours before using my software by themselves, I would make all sorts of different UI design choices. In fact, a command line or text UI interface might actually be the most productive. However, that is not the case.
Commercial and military cockpit design are all designed for the efficiency of the expert (especially military cockpits, since you do not want a “Are you sure” confirmation dialog during a dogfight).
>> If you approach software design the way experts in commercial and military cockpit human factors approach their craft, you will end up with designs that are fast, familiar, and forgiving. Such designs would be a refreshing change in the ghastly world of PC software. They'd be a refreshing change in the world of general aviation, too.
> This completely ignores hundreds or even thousands of required flight hours. If I required my users to train for hundreds of hours before using my software by themselves, I would make all sorts of different UI design choices. In fact, a command line or text UI interface might actually be the most productive. However, that is not the case.
Not necessarily. Your objection seems to be relevant to the "fast" part, but there's a lot of software that (for instance) just ignores familiar established patterns because the designer wanted to be different. It almost all cases, it would be a great improvement if they just stopped doing that.
This completely ignores hundreds or even thousands of required flight hours. If I required my users to train for hundreds of hours before using my software by themselves, I would make all sorts of different UI design choices. In fact, a command line or text UI interface might actually be the most productive. However, that is not the case.
Commercial and military cockpit design are all designed for the efficiency of the expert (especially military cockpits, since you do not want a “Are you sure” confirmation dialog during a dogfight).