I work in ATC and we have several desks with around 12 to 18 screens. Not in that layout tho, but on a much larger banana form.
They are used at different support positions so not ATC radars. Mostly for monitoring but also used with keyboard and mouse.
The applications goes from technical surveillance of ops systems, to flow capacity (airspace capacity), meteo broadcast for all airports (ATIS) or ground-ground telecommunications of aeronautical data.
I have a friend who works for Transpower (company in charge of NZ electric grid) and occasionally goes into their control rooms. Apparently they have set ups like this. It gets worse, because there are several computers hooked up to the different monitors, so not only do they have a wall of monitors, they have a bunch of different keyboards and mice (mouses?) that they have to hunt through if they want to actually interact with something
They need to invest in some KVM switches. Just leave the monitors connected directly to the towers but route the input devices through the switch. There’s no good reason for a single person to face more than one keyboard and mouse at the same desk.
Reminds me of VirtualBox on Wayland. It won’t correctly capture the mouse, so it just exits and re-enters the window in random positions. Say, on guest you see it in middle left, you move it a bit to the right, and it jumps out of bottom right corner.
So, time to have a second mouse, and do USB passthrough.
But also UEFI on my HP mini PC doesn’t work with every keyboard, so a second keyboard for UEFI.
IDK but I’ve seen pics of 911 operator setups with some absurd number of screens and I bet there’s a lot of stuff that would be useful for them to have open.
Usual setup nowadays:
One monitor for the main CAD (computer aided dispatch) forms, one for map overview, eventually a third one for a unit overview(theye are often done on the map monitor these days), one for external data (browser window, video feeds,etc.), one below as a touchscreen for communication control (VoIP/Radio).
Most EMS Dispatch clients I have switched to a three+one touch setup ages by now and rather use a central dashboard for some less important views and feeds.
Makes sense yeah. I guess at this point it’s a monitoring station more than a computer, i.e the operator is not gonna have many interactions with it other than looking at the screens
My parents were 911 dispatchers for decades. It’s how they met. They had 7 monitors last time I visited them at work 20 years ago. Their applications seemed to be built on the idea they had multiple monitors worth of space that they’d be stretched across.
If I remember accurately, there were 2 computers (and thus 2 mice and 2 keyboards). The first computer had 5 monitors and was the Google Maps equivalent for where all the active ambulances in the city were. The main application stretched across multiple monitors and had sub-windows with different operations in them. I think it also managed the radio between dispatcher and ambulance. The second computer was dedicated to the phone, the caller, any history attached to the phone number, and all the data 911 gets about your location. It took up the remaining few monitors. By now it’s probably 1 computer and even more monitors.
Separate computers may be due to necessity. For example, one of the systems they need may have a provided computer to handle it that is managed and supported by that vendor on a separated network for security.
Wtf is this ? What the hell are they doing that requires 15 screens ?
It’s a cropped version of a BBC office someone could see from their apartment
I work in ATC and we have several desks with around 12 to 18 screens. Not in that layout tho, but on a much larger banana form.
They are used at different support positions so not ATC radars. Mostly for monitoring but also used with keyboard and mouse.
The applications goes from technical surveillance of ops systems, to flow capacity (airspace capacity), meteo broadcast for all airports (ATIS) or ground-ground telecommunications of aeronautical data.
Reminds me of the workstation from
“Halle Berry’s Breasts: The Movie”Swordfish.Despite the movie itself sucking, that’s a rad looking setup. I mean, it would suck to use for actual work, but its cool as hell.
“Halle Berry in a Bikini: The Younglings Awakening - A Kids Movie”The FlintstonesI think they’re great the way they are but maybe somebody will remake Total Recall again with her as Mary.
🤢
What aren’t they doing?
I have a friend who works for Transpower (company in charge of NZ electric grid) and occasionally goes into their control rooms. Apparently they have set ups like this. It gets worse, because there are several computers hooked up to the different monitors, so not only do they have a wall of monitors, they have a bunch of different keyboards and mice (mouses?) that they have to hunt through if they want to actually interact with something
They need to invest in some KVM switches. Just leave the monitors connected directly to the towers but route the input devices through the switch. There’s no good reason for a single person to face more than one keyboard and mouse at the same desk.
There’s plenty of good reasons. Redundancy, simplicity, speed, physical context switching…
Reminds me of VirtualBox on Wayland. It won’t correctly capture the mouse, so it just exits and re-enters the window in random positions. Say, on guest you see it in middle left, you move it a bit to the right, and it jumps out of bottom right corner.
So, time to have a second mouse, and do USB passthrough.
But also UEFI on my HP mini PC doesn’t work with every keyboard, so a second keyboard for UEFI.
There is crossplatform software for mouse/keyboard sharing.
Kiwi gang!
There’s
dozensat least three of us!I want to join, but they don’t let me
IDK but I’ve seen pics of 911 operator setups with some absurd number of screens and I bet there’s a lot of stuff that would be useful for them to have open.
Yeah, but not that many.
Usual setup nowadays: One monitor for the main CAD (computer aided dispatch) forms, one for map overview, eventually a third one for a unit overview(theye are often done on the map monitor these days), one for external data (browser window, video feeds,etc.), one below as a touchscreen for communication control (VoIP/Radio).
Most EMS Dispatch clients I have switched to a three+one touch setup ages by now and rather use a central dashboard for some less important views and feeds.
Makes sense yeah. I guess at this point it’s a monitoring station more than a computer, i.e the operator is not gonna have many interactions with it other than looking at the screens
My parents were 911 dispatchers for decades. It’s how they met. They had 7 monitors last time I visited them at work 20 years ago. Their applications seemed to be built on the idea they had multiple monitors worth of space that they’d be stretched across.
If I remember accurately, there were 2 computers (and thus 2 mice and 2 keyboards). The first computer had 5 monitors and was the Google Maps equivalent for where all the active ambulances in the city were. The main application stretched across multiple monitors and had sub-windows with different operations in them. I think it also managed the radio between dispatcher and ambulance. The second computer was dedicated to the phone, the caller, any history attached to the phone number, and all the data 911 gets about your location. It took up the remaining few monitors. By now it’s probably 1 computer and even more monitors.
Separate computers may be due to necessity. For example, one of the systems they need may have a provided computer to handle it that is managed and supported by that vendor on a separated network for security.
It’s 4. My daughter is an operator.
IIRC when keemstar posted it, it’s a BBC office
Gooning
It’s the boss screen, in a second they will Alt-Tab into Flight simulator.
I’ve seen stock traders where everyone on the floor had half that many. A few of them had 9.
When they’re looking up trades or news, they open a ridiculous number of windows while doing research.
They have 4 screens just to watch the markets and handle in-house controls.
What’s striking about this is the amount of whitespace on the screens. They are only using 1/2 - 1/4 of their screen space.
Traders love doing this
Not sure about this one, but I know quant traders sometimes like many screens with many dashboards for realtime trading.
Russian space program