ABSTRACT
Human Factors and Ergonomics have over 100 years history in the UK and USA, from humble beginnings at the turn of the last century to the current day. A detailed account of the historical developments in both the USA and UK may be found in Meister. W. F. Grether reports on the difficulties of reading the traditional three-needle altimeter which displays the height of the aircraft in three ranges: the longest needle indicates 100s of feet, the broad pointer indicates 1,000s of feet and the small pointer indicates 10,000s of feet. The term 'Human Factors' seems to have come from the USA to encompass any aspect of system design, operation, maintenance and disposal that has bearing on input or output. The terms Human Factors and Ergonomics are often used interchangeably or together. The environment that the command and control system operates within can be seen to be highly complex.
