| name | faa-hf-std |
| description | Knowledge base from the FAA Human Factors Design Standard (HF-STD-001B, 2016) — the FAA's consolidated human-factors / human-systems-integration design criteria for systems it manages, operates, or maintains. Use for requirement-level design rules on: general human-factors design principles; automation and function allocation; designing equipment for maintenance; displays, controls, and visual indicators; alarms, audio, and voice communications; the computer-human interface (information presentation, coding, interaction styles, windows, dialogue); keyboards, input devices, and workstation/workplace ergonomics; system security, personnel safety, environment, anthropometry, and user documentation; plus intended-use and tailoring guidance. It is a quantified, source-attributed synthesis (heavily citing MIL-STD-1472G, MIL-HDBK-759C, DOD-HFDG-ATCCS, NUREG-0700, NASA-STD-3000, ANSI, OSHA, ISO 9241). Complements nasa-hsi as a parallel HSI tradition from the civil-aviation domain. Scope limits: it is design criteria, NOT an HSI lifecycle/process model (use nasa-hsi, nasa-npr-7123, or dau-se-guidebook for process); it does NOT reproduce the third-party standards it cites; it is FAA-acquisition-oriented (ATC, towers, TRACONs, airway facilities), not a general consumer-UX guide; and it is thin on modern touchscreen/mobile, web, and AI-driven interface patterns and on quantitative human-reliability analysis. |
FAA Human Factors Design Standard (HF-STD-001B)
Source: FAA (US Government work, approved for public release) | Chapters: 9
When to use
Use this skill when you are specifying, designing, or evaluating the human-facing parts of an FAA-domain system — an air-traffic console, an airway-facility equipment rack, an operator display, an alarm scheme, a computer-human interface, an input device, or a workstation — and you need concrete, citable, quantified human-factors design criteria rather than a process narrative. It is the design-rule layer that sits beneath HSI lifecycle guidance.
Prerequisites: none — plain Markdown; no MCP server, API key, or licence tier needed at runtime.
How to Use This Skill
- Without arguments — load the core frameworks below: the standard's design philosophy, the shall/should and order-of-precedence rules, the controlled vocabulary, and the recurring design moves (quantify the quality, two-layer error handling, reserved color/signal coding, consequence-scaled percentiles, design-for-maintenance).
- With a topic — ask about a design area (e.g. "automation authority", "alarm physics", "control-indicator integration", "anthropometric percentiles", "console geometry", "destructive-action confirmation") and route to the chapter via the Topic Index.
- With a chapter —
ch02 (automation), ch04 (displays/controls), ch05 (alarms/audio), ch06–ch07 (computer-human interface), ch08 (input devices/workstations), ch09 (safety/anthropometry/documentation/tailoring).
Supporting files: glossary.md, patterns.md, cheatsheet.md.
Design criteria, not a process model. HF-STD-001B tells you what an acceptable design must be — the millimetres, newtons, decibels, contrast ratios, and percentile rules. It does not tell you where in the lifecycle to address human factors. Pair it with nasa-hsi (the HSI process layer) — the two interlock at the source level, since many HF-STD rules cite NASA-STD-3000A.
Core Frameworks & Mental Models
What the standard is
HF-STD-001B is the FAA's single consolidated reference of human-factors design criteria for systems the agency manages, operates, or maintains. Its defining feature is that it does not invent most of its rules: it aggregates and harmonizes prior human-engineering work — military standards (MIL-STD-1472G is the anchor, with MIL-HDBK-759C, MIL-STD-1800A, MIL-HDBK-761A, MIL-STD-411), agency handbooks (DOD-HFDG-ATCCS, NUREG-0700, NASA-STD-3000, UCRL, AFSC, EPRI, DISA), federal regulation (OSHA 29 CFR 1910/1926, FAA Orders), international ergonomics (ISO 9241), and human-factors literature — and re-states each requirement in FAA-applicable language with an explicit bracketed source. Read it as a curated synthesis with provenance, tuned to the FAA acquisition lifecycle.
Reading the standard: three meta-rules
- Shall vs should is load-bearing. A shall is binding; a should is a recommendation that holds in most cases but may involve trade-offs. Reading the verb is how you know what is contractually owed. Tailoring deliberately turns this dial up or down.
- Order of precedence. Where the standard's text conflicts with a cited reference, the standard governs — but it never overrides applicable law or regulation. For safety and environment, OSHA and FAA health-and-safety provisions take precedence over the military-derived rules.
- The bracketed-source ledger. Every rule carries its origin. That matters for precedence, for currency (at least one cited FAA Order is formally cancelled but still referenced), and for cross-pack linkage (NASA-STD-3000A brackets bridge to
nasa-hsi).
The recurring design philosophy
- Quantify the quality. "Legible", "reachable", "easy", "safe" all become numbers tied to a perceptual or biomechanical fact and verified against the worst-case condition.
- The human (and the protective/environmental component) is a subsystem, integrated technically from the concept phase forward, not bolted on at the end.
- Two-layer error handling: resistance (make errors hard to commit) plus tolerance (limit the damage of those that occur) — complements, never substitutes.
- User-centered, human-centered. Automate to support the operator, never to displace command; design within users' abilities; keep the user able to recover and override.
- Absence is not a signal. A dark light, a dimmed-off display, or a missing indication must never be the sole carrier of a critical condition.
Automation framework (ch02)
Automation exists to support the operator. Two hard shall anchors: keep the user in command, and never become so automation-dependent that a person cannot recover or run the system by hand. Use the levels-of-automation ladder to match authority to task risk (cap high-risk decisions at "suggest, do not execute"); evaluate function allocation (manual / partial / full / adaptive); and design against the named failure modes — technology-centered automation, silent automation, mode errors, automation bias, complacency, and manual-skill decay. Build for trust calibration (not maximum trust) and engineer the failure path first (failure indication, graceful degradation, accessible override).
Output and input loop (ch04)
Every display criterion descends from the eye (fovea, acuity, accommodation, dark adaptation) and every control criterion from the hand (reach, strength, dexterity). Display-type selection (flat-panel, large-screen, projection, stereoscopic, HUD, see-through, helmet-mounted) is an explicit engineering choice with when-to-use logic. Controls are systematized across a dozen-plus families, each with dimensions, forces, displacements, and a positive-feedback requirement. A single reserved color-coding map (flashing red / red / yellow / green / white / blue) spans displays and indicators. Bind every control to its indicator (proximity, standardized direction-of-movement, instantaneous feedback) and layer error-proofing onto critical controls (barriers, covers, interlocks, dead-man behavior).
Auditory channel (ch05)
An alarm is an information system, not a noise: announce the problem, convey priority and nature, guide the first response, and confirm whether the response worked. Manage alarm load (prioritize, cap at four levels, validate inputs, distinguish filtering from suppression). For non-verbal alerts, audio is a redundant pointer to a visual indication that defines the condition. Hit the salience window (loud and distinct but capped and never startling), limit distinct signals (4 absolute / 12 relative), and engineer voice-communication intelligibility as a measured, verified property.
Computer-human interface (ch06, ch07)
Presentation (ch06) treats the screen as a scarce attention budget: minimize information and screen density, match presentation to the task then to the user's scan path, and use coding as a constrained vocabulary with hard per-channel capacity caps. Interaction (ch07) is an interaction stack: choose the interaction type first (eight named styles against task/system/user-training), then its mechanics, then widgets, then the window system, then the system-level conversation of prompts/feedback/errors. Two motifs dominate: consistency (treated as a hard requirement, inconsistency as a defect) and feedback with recoverability (every action gets a response; destructive actions get explicit non-Enter confirmation; layered Undo/Cancel/Back).
Fit: devices, workstations, bodies (ch03, ch08, ch09)
Maintainability (ch03) is designed in by modular decomposition with ready access and quantified handling limits, plus poka-yoke assembly and layered hazardous-energy control (interlocks never substitute for lockout/tagout). Input devices and workstations (ch08) are sized by device-task fit and a consequence-scaled percentile convention. Anthropometry (ch09) runs on the design-limits approach: there is no average person, never design to the 50th percentile, never treat one percentile as universal across dimensions, never sum like-percentiles across segments, and always reduce borrowed strength/reach data toward the weakest likely operator. Security, safety, environment, and documentation (ch09) are requirement streams integrated from concept, and tailoring is the discipline that makes the whole standard affordable — done early, in detail, by a skilled human-factors practitioner.
Chapter Index
| # | Section(s) | Title | Key content |
|---|
| ch01 | 1–4 | Foundations: Scope, Definitions, General Design | Lifecycle-wide scope; shall/should; order of precedence; the controlled glossary (alert/caution/advisory/warning, automation taxonomy); the eight general-design themes; the curated-synthesis structure |
| ch02 | 5.1 | Automation | Keep-the-user-in-command anchors; levels-of-automation ladder; function allocation; trust/complacency/mode errors; information/control/adaptive automation; decision aids; fault management |
| ch03 | 5.2 | Designing Equipment for Maintenance | Equipment decomposition hierarchy; modularization; quantified lift/carry/reach limits; access openings, covers, fasteners, connectors; hazardous-energy control; labeling |
| ch04 | 5.3–5.4 | Displays, Printers, Controls, and Visual Indicators | Viewing geometry; luminance/contrast/glare; display-type selection; control families; reserved color coding; accidental-actuation prevention; control-indicator integration; accessibility |
| ch05 | 5.5 | Alarms, Audio, and Voice Communications | Alarm as information system; caution/warning/advisory classes; prioritization, filtering vs suppression; signal physics and the salience window; voice signals; measured voice-communication intelligibility |
| ch06 | 5.6.1–5.6.6 | CHI: Information Presentation and Coding | Information vs screen density; task-driven layout and scan path; legibility figures; coding capacity caps; reserved color meanings and redundancy; concealed info; dynamic update; graphs and maps |
|
Topic Index
- Accessibility / people with disabilities → ch04, ch08, ch09
- Adaptive automation → ch01, ch02
- Alarm filtering / suppression → ch05, ch01
- Alarms (as information system) → ch05
- Alert / caution / advisory / warning classes → ch05, ch01
- Anthropometry / percentile selection → ch09, ch08, ch01
- Audio signals / salience window → ch05
- Authentication / authorization / identification → ch09
- Automation (levels, authority) → ch02
- Automation bias / complacency → ch02
- Coding (color, brightness, shape, size, flash) → ch06, ch04
- Color reserved meanings → ch06, ch04, cheatsheet
- Command language / query language → ch07
- Connectors / fasteners → ch03
- Console geometry (wrap-around, stacked, team) → ch08
- Contrast / luminance / glare → ch04, ch06
- Controls (families, forces, coding) → ch04
- Control-indicator integration → ch04
- Dead-man control / accidental actuation → ch04
- Decision aids → ch02
- Design-limits approach → ch09, ch01
- Destructive-action confirmation → ch07
- Direct manipulation → ch07
- Displays (types, selection, geometry) → ch04
- Documentation / IETM → ch09
- Effective temperature / comfort zone → ch09
- Electrical / hazardous-energy safety → ch09, ch03
- Error resistance / error tolerance → ch01, ch02
- Fault management → ch02
- Feedback / response-time ladder → ch07
- Function allocation → ch02
- General design requirements → ch01
- Glossary (controlled vocabulary) → ch01
- Hotspot / pointing device → ch08
- Input devices (mouse, joystick, trackball, stylus) → ch08
Supporting Files
- glossary.md — key terms (alert classes, automation taxonomy, anthropometric and CHI vocabulary), alphabetical, with chapter references
- patterns.md — 16 reusable design techniques (quantify the quality, two-layer error handling, audio-as-pointer, design-for-maintenance, coding vocabulary, consequence-scaled percentiles, tailoring) with When / How / Trade-offs
- cheatsheet.md — signal-class and reserved-color tables, coding capacity caps, legibility and keyboard figures, percentile-selection table, hazard limits, and tells-and-smells
Scope & Limits
Covers: the design-criteria content of HF-STD-001B (December 30, 2016) — general human-factors design requirements; automation and function allocation; designing equipment for maintenance; displays, printers, controls, and visual indicators; alarms, audio, and voice communications; the computer-human interface (presentation, coding, interaction, windows, dialogue); keyboards, input devices, and workstation/workplace ergonomics; system security, personnel safety, environment, anthropometry and biomechanics, and user documentation; and the intended-use and tailoring guidance of Section 6. All of it synthesized in original words with the standard's bracketed source provenance preserved.
Does not cover: an HSI lifecycle or process model — this is the design-criteria layer; for process use nasa-hsi, nasa-npr-7123, or dau-se-guidebook. It does not reproduce the third-party standards it cites (MIL-STD-1472G, MIL-HDBK series, NUREG-0700, NASA-STD-3000, ISO 9241, OSHA regulations) — those remain their publishers' material and are named, not copied. It is thin on: modern touchscreen/gesture/mobile and web interface patterns, AI-driven and adaptive-UI design, and quantitative human-reliability analysis (for HRA-style methods see the system-safety packs). Some cited references are dated, and at least one cited FAA Order is formally cancelled but still referenced in the source — read the bracketed sources critically.
Jurisdiction / provenance: a US Government work prepared by the FAA Human Factors Branch, approved for public release with unlimited distribution (public domain). Guidance for FAA acquisition; broadly adoptable by analogy but not a regulation in itself. Source version: HF-STD-001B (December 30, 2016).
