I hadbeen working with analog production for years, and I discovered that Iwas doing more and better work on the DSE in a couple of hours. The largework surface and sturdy controls were a refreshing change from Tinkertoysystems where you squint at a screen while pushing virtual faders witha mouse. Affordance Whena control device's appearance reveals how it is to be used, it is saidto be an affordance. A button with a concave surface invites pressing,while a cylindrical knob suggests grasping and rotation. The manner in which control layout andaction match those of the controlled elements is called a mapping.
Theclassic example is the control layout for the burners of a stove.
In myexperience, stove controls rarely map well, often requiring a second attemptto get the correct burner lit. Consistency When multiple occurrences of similarinterface features are handled uniformly, the interface exhibits consistency. For example, a music system with separate button pairs for CD track selection,tape search, and FM tuning should have the right hand buttons all increaseor advance the media. Consistency is generally highly desirable, althoughthere are exceptions. A product should encourage the developmentof a mental model of its operation.