Comment by Gravityloss
1 day ago
These designs seem so honest. Ie the maker really tries to communicate to the user.
Compare to most modern UI:s that are all about demos and looks and actually hostile towards users. I can't know what direction is hot and cold in the shower because it's light gray on silver.
They're for safety-critical systems, so UI design is taken more seriously - as you can still see in aircraft and railway systems.
Didn't one of the US fighters used in the Pacific have its cockpit controls redesigned in the middle of the war? Something is telling me it was the P-40, but I'm pretty hazy on it.
A good industrial designer makes it about the user. A bad industrial designer makes it about themselves, the manufacturer, etc.
Industrial HMIs are still exactly as focused on communicating important info as old relay logic systems were
If it was done with computers there'd be a skinnable interface, and buttons would change from round to square corners and back again every six months, the messages would be light-purple-on-slightly-darker-purple, and the control panel would be at the top, then the bottom, then the left, then the right, and eventually dockable, as time went by.
Also one day you'd walk in and none of the displays or controls would be the same any more and you'd have experienced your first UI refresh of many more to come.