http://embeddedgurus.com/usability-bites/2007/12/lying-to-the-user-an-ounce-of-inaccuracy-is-worth-a-pound-of-explanation/ A Blog by Niall Murphy Fri, 21 Jan 2011 16:47:04 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 http://embeddedgurus.com/usability-bites/2007/12/lying-to-the-user-an-ounce-of-inaccuracy-is-worth-a-pound-of-explanation/comment-page-1/#comment-3 Charlie Mon, 11 Feb 2008 11:37:00 +0000 http://embeddedgurus.com/usability-bites/2007/12/24/lying-to-the-user-an-ounce-of-inaccuracy-is-worth-a-pound-of-explanation/#comment-3 I too have designed several digital pressure indicators and have resorted to using a "zero dead band capture" at marketing's insistence. As an engineer, I was perfectly happy to see the instrument displaying 0.001. That way I knew it was working properly and not gone dead. I usually restrict my capture range to +/- 2 displayable counts although I did increase this on some very low range sensors. I remember a similar situation when I had designed a portable field calibrator with 5 digit resolution. It had simultaneous input and output functions so the simple way to test or demo the unit was to jumper the input to the output. My boss was bring some (non-engineering) guests through the lab so I set the unit to the 1V range (its best) and keyed in 1. The output went to 1.00000 and the input showed 0.99999. The guest looked at it, sniffed, and said "not working too well I see!". Oh well, how does one type a sigh. I too have designed several digital pressure indicators and have resorted to using a “zero dead band capture” at marketing’s insistence. As an engineer, I was perfectly happy to see the instrument displaying 0.001. That way I knew it was working properly and not gone dead. I usually restrict my capture range to +/- 2 displayable counts although I did increase this on some very low range sensors. I remember a similar situation when I had designed a portable field calibrator with 5 digit resolution. It had simultaneous input and output functions so the simple way to test or demo the unit was to jumper the input to the output. My boss was bring some (non-engineering) guests through the lab so I set the unit to the 1V range (its best) and keyed in 1. The output went to 1.00000 and the input showed 0.99999. The guest looked at it, sniffed, and said “not working too well I see!”. Oh well, how does one type a sigh.

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