The Head-Up Display

The Head-Up Display [Lon01] or HUD is now a standard feature on many aircraft, especially fighters. The idea is even being used in some automobiles. In both cases, information (such as speed, altitude, etc.) is projected in a semi-transparent fashion over the outside view. Thus the operator (whether pilot or driver) is not required to shift attention between what is going on outside and the instrument panel. All of the most important information is available in one place.

The HUD concept is very appealing for general computer use, and it is quite surprising that it has not become widespread. The diagram below shows a mock-up of a HUD element to control scrolling and zoom in a browser.

As can be seen from the above concept diagram, the four scroll arrows are close together, and are displayed as a semi-transparent overlay on top of the content. This configuration would reduce the need for extensive mouse movements towards the scroll bars, and back again into the content to click on the hyperlinks. To maximize the user's comfort, the overlay could be made to appear and disappear at the click of a mouse button or the touch of a key.

The number in the middle of the scroll overlay indicates the zoom level. Zooming could be commanded via a variety of means, such as with the keyboard or the mouse wheel. For browser applications, making the text larger or smaller (as Mozilla currently allows) should be sufficient to implement the zooming functionality itself.

While the current preliminary release of Flightdeck-UI does not include any HUD elements, they are planned for future versions.