[Elecraft] [somewhat K3]Radio User Interfaces

[Bill Frantz]

Many people who are involved with User Interface (UI) design 
think that user errors frequently reflect design flaws in the 
UI. While I wouldn't go as far as to say all user errors result 
from UI flaws, I do think that better UI design can 
significantly reduce the number or severity of user errors.

My wife (KI6SLX), a retired Apple quality assurance manager, had 
a long conversation with an Elecraft representative at RadioFest 
in Monterey recently. Her interest was whether she could learn 
to use the radio. (She has no HF operating experience. Her 2+ 
year use of a FT-60 has been punctuated with frequent screams of 
anguish.) As he led her through the UI, she noticed that there 
was a logic to the way things worked. She realized she could 
build a mental model of the radio's operation and possibly even 
use it without constant reference to the manual. That 
conversation is one of the reasons I now have a K3.

Is the K3 UI perfect? Of course not. But, it is quite good. One 
way to make it better is to look at user errors and ask, "How 
can we change the UI to reduce the chance of this error occurring?"

Cheers - Bill, AE6JV

On 4/13/12 at 12:47, km4ik.ian at gmail.com (Ian Kahn - Ham) wrote:

>It's a safe (but unscientifically generated statistic) bet that 
>70-80% of the issues/problems reported on this forum are user 
>error or lack of knowledge/understanding about the rig.

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