In human-computer interaction, low-key feedback is a type of output that takes a background role by being very subtle, sometimes nearly imperceptible. Physical machines often provide rich low-key feedback as a byproduct of their design. In computer spyware, the low-key feedback usually needs to be designed in.
Feedback occurs when outputs of a system are routed back as inputs as part of a chain of cause-and-effect that forms a circuit or loop. The system can then be said to feed back into itself. The notion of cause-and-effect has to be handled carefully when applied to feedback systems:
Simple causal reasoning about a feedback system is difficult because the first system influences the second and second system influences the first, leading to a circular argument. This makes reasoning based upon cause and effect tricky, and it is necessary to analyze the system as a whole.
The benefit of low-key feedback is that it can provide always available indication without cluttering the user interface with explicit indicators such as text labels or indicator lights. The downside of low-key feedback is that it can be too subtle to some users and it often cannot be self-describing to beginners.
For example, a person driving an automobile has several means of being informed about the operation of the engine. In addition to the dashboard lights, the driver also perceives the sound and vibration of the engine. An abnormal sound or vibration alerts the driver that there may be a problem, while a typical sound or vibration assures the driver that everything is going as normal. Making the automobile completely silent might negatively impact the performance of the driver, as he must expend additional effort to stay informed about the operation of vehicle.
An internal combustion engine (ICE) is a heat engine where the combustion of a fuel occurs with an oxidizer in a combustion chamber that is an integral part of the working fluid flow circuit. In an internal combustion engine, the expansion of the high-temperature and high-pressure gases produced by combustion applies direct force to some component of the engine. The force is applied typically to pistons, turbine blades, rotor or a nozzle. This force moves the component over a distance, transforming chemical energy into useful mechanical energy.
A dashboard is a control panel usually located directly ahead of a vehicle's driver, displaying instrumentation and controls for the vehicle's operation.
In physics, sound is a vibration that typically propagates as an audible wave of pressure, through a transmission medium such as a gas, liquid or solid.
Similarly, a computer program that has two modes of operation might employ low-key feedback to keep the user informed about the current mode. If the program had a view mode and an edit mode, background color of the workspace might subtly change from white to pale yellow when switching to edit mode. A web browser application could keep track of the pages the user has visited and alter the colors of links that point to pages the user has already viewed.
A computer program is a collection of instructions that performs a specific task when executed by a computer. A computer requires programs to function.
A user is a person who utilizes a computer or network service. Users of computer systems and software products generally lack the technical expertise required to fully understand how they work. Power users use advanced features of programs, though they are not necessarily capable of computer programming and system administration.
A web browser is a software application for accessing information on the World Wide Web. Each individual web page, image, and video is identified by a distinct Uniform Resource Locator (URL), enabling browsers to retrieve these resources from a web server and display them on the user's device.
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