Mode (user interface): Difference between revisions

Revision as of 13:10, 1 March 2024

Revision as of 04:26, 31 July 2024

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===Modeless===

[[Larry Tesler]] at [[PARC (company)|PARC]] devised insights for a modeless [[word processor]] from the feedback gathered from a [[user test]] with newly-hired Sylvia Adams, where she was asked to [[ad lib]] some gestures to correct proofreading marks on the digital text.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://spectrum.ieee.org/computing/software/of-modes-and-men|title=Of Modes and Men|website=IEEE Spectrum: Technology, Engineering, and Science News|date=August 2005|language=en|access-date=2020-02-21}}</ref> This test convinced Tesler's manager Bill English of the problems with their previous modal interface.

== Mode errors ==

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* Mode confusion was part of the events that led to the loss of [[Air France Flight 447]] in 2009, and the loss of life of 228 people. The pilots reacted to a loss of altitude by pulling on the stick, which would have been an appropriate reaction with the autopilot fully enabled, which would then have put the aircraft in a climbing configuration. However, the airplane's systems had entered a mode of lesser automation ("direct law" in Airbus terms) due to a blocked airspeed sensor, allowing the pilots to put the plane in a nose-high stall configuration, from which they did not recover.<ref>[https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/11/uss-mccain-collision-ultimately-caused-by-ui-confusion/ BEA final report on the loss of Air France 447]</ref>

* According to the [[National Transportation Safety Board|NTSB]], one of the factors contributing to the 2013 [[Asiana Airlines Flight 214]] crash was ''"the complexities of the autothrottle and autopilot flight director systems … which increased the likelihood of mode error".''<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20140625051127/http://www.ntsb.gov/news/events/2014/asiana214/abstract.html National Transportation Safety Board] {{dead link|date=February 2023}}</ref><ref>[http://blog.martindoms.com/2011/01/24/poor-ui-design-can-kill/ Poor UI design can kill]</ref>

* On January 17, 2015, the offshore supply vessel "Red7 Alliance" collided with a lock gate of the Kiel Canal in Germany, damaging it severely. An investigation concluded that the levers controlling the ship's [[Azimuth thruster]]s were not used in a way appropriate to the mode they were set to, resulting in the ship accelerating instead of coming to a stop in the lock.<ref>[https://www.bsu-bund.de/SharedDocs/pdf/DE/Unfallberichte/2016/Untersuchungsbericht_16_15.pdf?__blob=publicationFile&v=5 M/V Red7 Alliance investigation report] (in German)</ref>

* On August 21, 2017, the US Navy destroyer [[USS John S. McCain (DDG-56)|USS John S. McCain]] [[USS John S. McCain and Alnic MC collision|collided]] with a commercial tanker in the Strait of Malacca, resulting in the loss of life of ten crew members. An investigation conducted by the US military concluded that immediately prior to the collision, helm and propulsion controls had been redistributed between bridge stations, and the bridge crew was not fully aware of that redistribution.<ref>{{cite web | url=https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2017/11/uss-mccain-collision-ultimately-caused-by-ui-confusion/ | title=USS McCain collision ultimately caused by UI confusion| year=2017}}</ref>