One that I've used: when I bought my first electric car, I thought about the fact that everything about the way the car produced motion was entirely different than every car I had ever driven. It was a far simpler implementation under the hood (literally). And I loved that.
But what I also loved is that...in many ways (other than the otherworldly quietness and shocking acceleration), it was...just like driving a "normal" car. And the reason: the "API" had remained the same. The interface between the driver and the car (ok, let's call it the DCI) was just like every other (automatic transmission) car I've ever driven. Two pedals, a steering wheel and a gear selector. The gear selector was on the steering column...but I'm old enough to have had one of those before.
It's part of what made it such a successful transition: the implementation had changed, but the API/DCI had remained the same.
One interesting thing is what's hitting Tesla today. They've moved the gear selector to the screen, and they've moved turn signals from a stalk to buttons...in essence, they've made an upgrade with an incompatible API. And they are facing a lot of backlash because of it!
I love the analogy of everyday objects and APIs.
One that I've used: when I bought my first electric car, I thought about the fact that everything about the way the car produced motion was entirely different than every car I had ever driven. It was a far simpler implementation under the hood (literally). And I loved that.
But what I also loved is that...in many ways (other than the otherworldly quietness and shocking acceleration), it was...just like driving a "normal" car. And the reason: the "API" had remained the same. The interface between the driver and the car (ok, let's call it the DCI) was just like every other (automatic transmission) car I've ever driven. Two pedals, a steering wheel and a gear selector. The gear selector was on the steering column...but I'm old enough to have had one of those before.
It's part of what made it such a successful transition: the implementation had changed, but the API/DCI had remained the same.
One interesting thing is what's hitting Tesla today. They've moved the gear selector to the screen, and they've moved turn signals from a stalk to buttons...in essence, they've made an upgrade with an incompatible API. And they are facing a lot of backlash because of it!