h a l f b a k e r y
Contrary to popular belief
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PROBLEM:
The "one size fits all" nature of most appliance UIs renders them unusable by certain demographic groups.
SOLUTION:
Standardize the ability to customize the UI on any modern household appliance.
RATIONALE:
Consider an average household microwave oven. The UI ordinarily consists of
a keypad with numbers, a START button, a STOP button, a button to open the door, and any of various other buttons and doodads, along with a readout. For *many* people, this interface is too much. Some people use a microwave only to cook popcorn, for example. For such people, all that is necessary is a single button "make popcorn" (which could be further simplified with just a picture of a popcorn kernel). It would be nice if, in addition to the microwave oven, I could purchase a "swappable" set of UI components, so that I could customize the interface whenever I wanted to, to reflect my preferences.
PITFALLS:
People might wind up losing the UI to their appliances, just like they lose their remote control. This could be mitigated by making the UI a LCD 'touchscreen' monitor built-in to the appliance, but then that would make them more expensive.
Annotation:
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My microwave has a "Popcorn" button. But yeah, there too many other buttons on it. |
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This seems like a good idea, but is actually a horrible one. Customizable UIs in software already make tech support into a nightmare. More software-like UIs are the last thing we need for clueless users. |
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Instead, focus should be on "simpler" UIs. Best Microwave interface I've seen: a power dial, and a time dial. Turning the dial starts the oven, opening the door stops it (you could add a "popcorn" button to it, but that's it...) |
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On the other hand, it could be useful for hackers. I'm taking the fishbone away... |
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I like this because it would let me do what I already do with my email client, web browser and many other applications - it seems a natural extension to want to do the same with household appliances too. |
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On the other hand, there's a possibility that less technology-comfortable users would shy away from customisable UI's, "in case I break something by changing things". If you can get around that and help them find a (perceived) benefit, this could be a good sales gimmick at least. |
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