5 ms·

I think this is a world totally foreign to what HN's world is about, which is why it's so charming/aesthetically pleasing. (exaggerating a bit, but not that mu

I think this is a world totally foreign to what HN's world is about, which is why it's so charming/aesthetically pleasing. (exaggerating a bit, but not that much) The reason that these switches and dials are ok to be hardcoded in metal and glass is that they (and the people) do the same thing, over and over, year after year, for decades at a time. Rinse and repeat. Versus the software world (or more accurately, the world of starting up new things and experiments within months) -- where you don't know what you're building yet, whether it will work, and if it will still exist next year.

atemerev 6y ago
There are many Russians on HN, myself included. So, not foreign to everyone. :)
- jscheel 6y ago
  I believe they meant functionally foreign, not culturally foreign.
- varjag 6y ago
  It's pretty foreign to Russians who grew up after Soviet collapse.
eecc 6y ago
I'm sure there's plenty of hardcoded panels that will be used to control the same process for decades also in the "western" world.
- squarefoot 6y ago
  No idea if they're doing the same thing in the military, but the ongoing rush to swap every damn button panel with a touchscreen is like a million disasters waiting to happen.
  - porknubbins 6y ago
    Not waiting to happen- Wasn’t there a US Navy ship that collided recently because the throttles were done in software?
- TheCapn 6y ago
  Generally not in my experience. Things are still heavily driven from SCADA/HMI systems because its just economical to drop a PC in and be virtually future proof to whatever changes you make at your plant. I've been part of a few jobs that have panels similar to what you're discussing but my presence there is to make sure the 3rd party builder signs off then we immediately bypass the panel's physical controls with a PLC+HMI system for the client. (Fertilizer blending system)
Dahoon 6y ago
The same kind of controls in the US does not look "charming/aesthetically pleasing". It is because they were good at it.
red_admiral 6y ago
Some of them look like railway signalling panels. We still have a lot of them in Europe, newer ones are computerised of course but still plenty of relay-based ones in operation.
- supernova87a 6y ago
  Speaking of this, when I see metro/subway systems in Asia, I think about how they decide to hard-code vs. have dynamic displays for the in-car maps and station announcements. You know, because their subway systems actually grow and change over there, during the course of a few years.
frosted-flakes 6y ago
Yeah, but my car has air conditioning, and it's not going away. It needs a button to turn it on and off. It gets pressed several times a day for 20 years (except winter). Why does that button ever need to change?
- WalterBright 6y ago
  Yet change it does. In my old car, the A/C is a button labeled "A/C". In new cars, I can't figure out how to turn it on. It's similar to each iteration of Windows. I'm convinced that Microsoft takes 1000 darts, labels each with a command like "backup", and has a blind monkey throw it at a dartboard to determine where it goes. At least Microsoft labels them with words, like "Control Panel", even though what's in it is completely random from one iteration to the next. The car companies label all the buttons with random splotches inspired by fingerpainting toddlers.
  - supernova87a 6y ago
    cf. BMW's dumb iDrive system edit: and now that I think about it, I'm suddenly interested in understanding why consumer products seem averse to providing detailed/specific buttons compared to professional products? Is it to try to not overwhelm the casual / amateur user? (or conversely to be able to reach that user) For example, professional video cameras that have physical buttons and dials for every function, versus consumer cameras that hide that 3 layers deep in a virtual menu. Or, the cockpit of a jet (and all its displays and controls) versus a passenger car. Or how about a long-distance truck console -- is it similar? Maybe it's the issue of casual / lowest common demoninator users not being overwhelmed by such detail. Or that if you cannot filter your users to the ones who can or want to handle the detail, you have to design to the lowest bar. Which is a shame for those who want / like the detail.
    - milesvp 6y ago
      I suspect a lot of it has to do with cost. Iterating hardware is expensive. On top of that tactile buttons are more expensive than you'd think, and Bill Of Materials can trump a lot of other decisions in hardware. Some of it is also perception. The first cars that were likely to have in touch displays were luxury cars, and there you could show how advanced the car was by showing that there were no buttons anywhere. That said, I'm starting to see a move back towards buttons in high end cars again. Here's hoping that that filters down to lower end cars. Much as I prefer buying used cars, I'd still like to be able to buy a car newer than 2012 some day.
orbital-decay 6y ago
I think "HN's world" is kind of large, it doesn't only consist of web developers. The reason these were made in hardware is there were no software-driven SCADAs and cheap and abundant large displays back then, or at least they were in their infancy. >starting up new things and experiments within months >you don't know what you're building yet, whether it will work, and if it will still exist next year. That's exactly how fast things moved when these control rooms were designed, though. Even in the Soviet industries which were generally inflexible and optimized for 5-year iterations, there was constant experimentation and plenty of lean and mean engineering organizations. The reason you're perceiving industrial equipment design as slow is that you live in an entirely different era. It doesn't have to be slow, and it wasn't always like that.
kemitchell 6y ago
> The reason that these switches and dials are ok to be hardcoded in metal and glass is that they (and the people) do the same thing, over and over, year after year, for decades at a time. Rinse and repeat. The keys on my keyboard and mouse have been hardcoded into metal and plastic since I started programming. Likewise the frets of guitars I've played since boyhood. That does not mean I've been doing the same thing over and over for decades at a time, rinse and repeat. Or maybe it does.

atemerev 6y ago

There are many Russians on HN, myself included. So, not foreign to everyone. :)

jscheel 6y ago
I believe they meant functionally foreign, not culturally foreign.
varjag 6y ago
It's pretty foreign to Russians who grew up after Soviet collapse.

eecc 6y ago

I'm sure there's plenty of hardcoded panels that will be used to control the same process for decades also in the "western" world.

squarefoot 6y ago
No idea if they're doing the same thing in the military, but the ongoing rush to swap every damn button panel with a touchscreen is like a million disasters waiting to happen.
- porknubbins 6y ago
  Not waiting to happen- Wasn’t there a US Navy ship that collided recently because the throttles were done in software?
TheCapn 6y ago
Generally not in my experience. Things are still heavily driven from SCADA/HMI systems because its just economical to drop a PC in and be virtually future proof to whatever changes you make at your plant. I've been part of a few jobs that have panels similar to what you're discussing but my presence there is to make sure the 3rd party builder signs off then we immediately bypass the panel's physical controls with a PLC+HMI system for the client. (Fertilizer blending system)

Dahoon 6y ago

The same kind of controls in the US does not look "charming/aesthetically pleasing". It is because they were good at it.

red_admiral 6y ago

Some of them look like railway signalling panels. We still have a lot of them in Europe, newer ones are computerised of course but still plenty of relay-based ones in operation.

supernova87a 6y ago
Speaking of this, when I see metro/subway systems in Asia, I think about how they decide to hard-code vs. have dynamic displays for the in-car maps and station announcements. You know, because their subway systems actually grow and change over there, during the course of a few years.

frosted-flakes 6y ago

Yeah, but my car has air conditioning, and it's not going away. It needs a button to turn it on and off. It gets pressed several times a day for 20 years (except winter). Why does that button ever need to change?

WalterBright 6y ago
Yet change it does. In my old car, the A/C is a button labeled "A/C". In new cars, I can't figure out how to turn it on. It's similar to each iteration of Windows. I'm convinced that Microsoft takes 1000 darts, labels each with a command like "backup", and has a blind monkey throw it at a dartboard to determine where it goes. At least Microsoft labels them with words, like "Control Panel", even though what's in it is completely random from one iteration to the next. The car companies label all the buttons with random splotches inspired by fingerpainting toddlers.
- supernova87a 6y ago
  cf. BMW's dumb iDrive system edit: and now that I think about it, I'm suddenly interested in understanding why consumer products seem averse to providing detailed/specific buttons compared to professional products? Is it to try to not overwhelm the casual / amateur user? (or conversely to be able to reach that user) For example, professional video cameras that have physical buttons and dials for every function, versus consumer cameras that hide that 3 layers deep in a virtual menu. Or, the cockpit of a jet (and all its displays and controls) versus a passenger car. Or how about a long-distance truck console -- is it similar? Maybe it's the issue of casual / lowest common demoninator users not being overwhelmed by such detail. Or that if you cannot filter your users to the ones who can or want to handle the detail, you have to design to the lowest bar. Which is a shame for those who want / like the detail.
  - milesvp 6y ago
    I suspect a lot of it has to do with cost. Iterating hardware is expensive. On top of that tactile buttons are more expensive than you'd think, and Bill Of Materials can trump a lot of other decisions in hardware. Some of it is also perception. The first cars that were likely to have in touch displays were luxury cars, and there you could show how advanced the car was by showing that there were no buttons anywhere. That said, I'm starting to see a move back towards buttons in high end cars again. Here's hoping that that filters down to lower end cars. Much as I prefer buying used cars, I'd still like to be able to buy a car newer than 2012 some day.

orbital-decay 6y ago

I think "HN's world" is kind of large, it doesn't only consist of web developers. The reason these were made in hardware is there were no software-driven SCADAs and cheap and abundant large displays back then, or at least they were in their infancy. >starting up new things and experiments within months >you don't know what you're building yet, whether it will work, and if it will still exist next year. That's exactly how fast things moved when these control rooms were designed, though. Even in the Soviet industries which were generally inflexible and optimized for 5-year iterations, there was constant experimentation and plenty of lean and mean engineering organizations. The reason you're perceiving industrial equipment design as slow is that you live in an entirely different era. It doesn't have to be slow, and it wasn't always like that.

kemitchell 6y ago

> The reason that these switches and dials are ok to be hardcoded in metal and glass is that they (and the people) do the same thing, over and over, year after year, for decades at a time. Rinse and repeat. The keys on my keyboard and mouse have been hardcoded into metal and plastic since I started programming. Likewise the frets of guitars I've played since boyhood. That does not mean I've been doing the same thing over and over for decades at a time, rinse and repeat. Or maybe it does.