This has been a running discussion for a while now and I'd love to hear some opinions on how this community would like to see the presentation of Binary Switches. I'm talking about those simple 'On/Off' toggles.
For such a seemingly simple control feature, it sure seems to dredge up a fairly animated discussion of how to best portray it. For example, the 0/1 rocker style power switch on the back of your computer: That's pure binary. Pure programmer: '1' is _obviously_ 'true', meaning ON... '0' is _obviously_ 'false'; your computer is off." But if you've ever found yourself dealing with some sort of voodoo curse situation where your computer simply does not boot -- you may have found yourself finally double checking the main power switch on the back of the system: You may have found yourself carefully pulling your tower out from under your desk. After creating slack in your audio, USB cabling, your ethernet and who-know-whatever-else you have plugged into the back... you get the tower out and into the light. You can finally see the power switch. But what does it mean? If the '1' is farther away from the chassis, with the '0' flush, does that mean it's supposed to be ON? Or the other way around? Should the '1' be 'UP'? Or if the '1' is pressed down against the chassis, is that 'ON'? I don't think the current design really demonstrates any logical way of knowing what is 'ON' and what is 'OFF'. So that brings me to the question of 'obvious' binary switches: With the flood that is hitting the market in touch sensitive interfaces, numerous products are capable of allowing the user to turn on/off their lights, turn on/off their fireplace, turn on/off their hottub pump, open/close their garage door (from a location that is not at all in sight of the garage door), and the designers suddenly have the potential to clearly label not only the current state, but the expected result from another push of that button. The market -- thus far -- has simply addressed these issues from an old school lightswitch mentality: One state is *positive*, the other state is *negative*. It seems they've tried to implement what people know for colours: Green is ON Red (or neutral) is OFF. What text do you think should be displayed on the buttons in each state? ________________________________________________________________ Welcome to the Interaction Design Association (IxDA)! To post to this list ....... [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe ................ http://gamma.ixda.org/unsubscribe List Guidelines ............ http://gamma.ixda.org/guidelines List Help .................. http://gamma.ixda.org/help
