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Interfaces for industrial environments

Designing the screens of people who work on the shop floor

Terminals held in the hand, a scanner instead of a keyboard, small screens, data that comes from management systems the company has used for years. These are the conditions in which we design interfaces for the shop floor.

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What we keep in mind

The condition
What we do
The screen is that of a handheld terminal
The screens are drawn for that screen, not adapted from a website for computers.
You type with the scanner
Reading a barcode is the normal way to enter data; the keyboard is used only when there is no other way. Each screen has a single field to fill in, and you can see at once which one.
It is used standing, walking around the floor
Few buttons, large ones, and no operation that needs precision.
Whoever uses it changes department or plant
The terminal knows where it is and shows what is needed there, without asking.
Priorities change during the shift
The state can be understood at a glance.
The data lives in a management system that is already there
We connect it with APIs written for the purpose, or in the way that system allows, so that whoever is on the floor sees the state up to date.

What we carry into every project

  1. 01

    Fewer things to set

    If the software can work out by itself where the person using it is, it does not ask.

  2. 02

    One screen, one thing to do

    Each screen answers one question and shows the button to act on it.

  3. 03

    Test it where the work is

    An interface for the shop floor we judge on the shop floor, with the terminal in hand, not on the office monitor.

An experience

The production lines of a manufacturing company

The full case

The company has several plants in Italy, and the priorities of the lines change even several times in the same shift. We wrote a web app for the ZEBRA terminals the operators carry with them, and the APIs that connect it to the AS400. Today the operator sees production status in real time and moves lines among those of the plant they are in.

Do you have an interface nobody uses on the floor?

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