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A collection of Soviet control rooms (2017)

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Re: A collection of Soviet control rooms (2017)

#41

Can you even imagine how relaxing it would be to have the same interface to your systems, every day, with all the parts in one physical location and never moving? Learn it once, then nothing changes for years and years, or if it does it's usually adding on, not replacing or re-arranging existing stuff? Man, that would be nice.

I can see it working for certain industries, but overall we need digital systems too. I work in manufacturing (biotech); everything we do uses a automated recipe, and there are only a handful of systems where we need an operator to directly interact with a UI to make stuff happen.

Re: A collection of Soviet control rooms (2017)

#42

Can you even imagine how relaxing it would be to have the same interface to your systems, every day, with all the parts in one physical location and never moving? Learn it once, then nothing changes for years and years, or if it does it's usually adding on, not replacing or re-arranging existing stuff? Man, that would be nice.

> not replacing or re-arranging existing stuff? Man, that would be nice.

I've met some people who miss those phones with "bottom 40%", that is pre-iphone era phones with hard coded plastic buttons.

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/want-new-iphone-blame-steve-j...

Re: A collection of Soviet control rooms (2017)

#45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it's a graphical representation of the RBMK control rods [1]. It's also in the last two images. These are replaceable control rods that were laid out in a circular pattern in the RBMK class reactors. 1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RBMK

It's not nearly enough rods for an RBMK. Those were huge. And they had nothing outside the circle. Probably another type of nuclear facility. Maybe a medical isotope reactor? The second last photo looks like an RBMK or at least something that size.

If you click on the picture it says it's the Kola nuclear power plant, which is a VVER-440 reactor. Searching for other VVER pictures, e.g.[1], confirms that they match.

[1] http://www.nucleartourist.com/areas/vver440a.htm

Re: A collection of Soviet control rooms (2017)

#47

I've operated in boiler room offices at large plants for almost 40 years, the mimic panel is a very valuable tool. With miles of piping carrying water and steam for various reasons, the panels help keep it all straight in your mind. These panels are in hospitals, chemical plants, data centers, Navy ships and subs and many other places similar to where I work. I can't imagine what it feels like to work in a nuke facil…

After working with mimic panels for years on steam plants, I got exposed to an older, pre-mimic-panel design.

I appreciated the mimic panel's beauty for the first time on that day.

Re: A collection of Soviet control rooms (2017)

#48
post #37

Can you even imagine how relaxing it would be to have the same interface to your systems, every day, with all the parts in one physical location and never moving? Learn it once, then nothing changes for years and years, or if it does it's usually adding on, not replacing or re-arranging existing stuff? Man, that would be nice.

Especially if the interface was designed for high performance (unlike most UX today). One of my favorite was when I spent years starting to learn photojournalism on the side: the mechanics of using a camera is only a small part of it (it's mostly about understanding and conveying a story), but even at my student/amateur level, the muscle memory with pro DSLR and lenses was crazy-effective. I even got a shot that happ…

f8 and be there.

Re: A collection of Soviet control rooms (2017)

#50

I agree it's really aesthetic (I love the circle arrangements with indicator lights occurring in several in them, I assume it's something reactor related). Are such control rooms still made today, or is it all digital screens?

Digital screens, but they mimic the mimics shown here.
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