PDA in AutomationWorld – Beyond Convergence: Designing Industrial Software That People Already Know How to Use

Operators shouldn’t have to relearn software every time they switch screens.

That’s the problem with a lot of industrial applications. SCADA looks one way. Production reporting looks another. Quality has its own navigation. Equipment performance dashboards feel like they came from a different company entirely, because they usually did.

Meanwhile, outside the plant, software stopped working that way years ago. Online banking, email, cloud tools. Different companies, same expectations. You already know how to use them before you open them.

Eric Williams, our digitalization group manager, put it well in a new Automation World article: “The first step was adopting the development practices of modern software. The next step is applying those same principles to the people using the software.”

That’s the thinking behind our library of standardized interface components. Instead of building every SCADA, MES, OEE, or recipe management screen from scratch, we start from a common set of proven building blocks. Same navigation logic. Same layouts. Same behavior, no matter which application an operator is in.

As Pierce Thompson, one of our solution specialists, said in the piece: “Every manufacturing operation is unique. The functionality should reflect those differences, but the user experience shouldn’t.”

The result is software that adapts to dark mode, accessibility needs, and different devices, control room displays, workstations, tablets, without losing consistency. And for a workforce that grew up on intuitive apps, that consistency isn’t a nice-to-have. It’s the baseline expectation.

Full article here: https://www.automationworld.com/factory/digital-transformation/news/55393709/beyond-convergence-designing-industrial-software-people-already-know-how-to-use