Comments to Computing Interfaces
“Software is our interface to the world.”— Lev Manovich, <Software Takes Command>
In contemporary society, people’s lives always involved with technologies, and laptops and smartphones are mostly often used. Now, those machines can be the platforms for people to get access to global information and to take advantage from for different reasons. More importantly, the interface connects people with machines through what shows and functions on that platform. Programming helps people build the platform and makes the interface happen. The interface provides people the opportunities to use what the software programming created in every aspect of their lives, and therefore it creates a greater value of the digital world. People who don’t know how to program can still use software like Word, emails, browsers, APPs, etc. People are able to use a computer to fulfill their requirements of multiple tasks. People are empowered by what they can create and what they can explore, especially on software such as Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Illustrator.
In addition, with more functions and tools that those interfaces create, people are getting more comfortable with the high-technology environment and then rely on software. Machines are not cold hard drives that only serve for an independent activity, they are becoming tools that help people in their work field, social field, and inner field. Those fields are interconnected because of interfaces. Using the example in the introduction of Manovich’s book, he says Media applications are “software for creating, editing, and Organizing media content”. Interfaces allow people to express their creativities and feelings and connect them with other perspectives of their lives. People can create their portfolios with their media skills for job searching, and they can share their works on Facebook. Eventually, software can also connect and develop to become a border interface once it finds what are people’s new needs. The hard drives will also need to develop to fulfill the conditions of software development. Constantly, people are changing the technology and the technology is changing them too.
It is impossible to say the interfaces and how human interact with the machine through interfaces either in a good way or a bad way, but they affect how we think and act deeply. For instance, in the past time we usually wrote on papers, and later we wrote things on the computer in TXT format, and then we have more software such as Word Documents so we can add pictures and we can make everything more organized. It’s just a small detail but it is a significant change. People are getting more adapt to the fast pace of lives and new multi-media society. The way people think and act are deeper and more complicated because there are so many they can do in the digital world. There are so many ways to make self-expression and to approach different information. People feel fewer material constraints compared in the past because basically, they can do anything on one to two machines. Moreover, it is a continuous process. For example, people can store and access their documents through Cloud. However, centralized and portable information doesn’t mean less information, people can be overwhelmed by the interfaces too. The market is competitive and more and more software is getting similar, then how do people choose one of many of them? Also, software is built from programming, and codes are changeable, everything people has access to right now is not permanent.
Source:
https://issuu.com/bloomsburypublishing/docs/9781623566722_web
