5 Feb /18

Interface

Interface – Word of the day - EVS Translations
Interface – Word of the day – EVS Translations

Often considered in the context of technological jargon – especially when something isn’t working – the word interface actually represents a common and very necessary concept. Still, before explaining why it’s useful, let’s dispel some of the mystery surrounding the word itself.

Coming from the combining of the Latin inter, meaning ‘between’, and facies, meaning ‘appearance or form’, interface literally and originally meant a ‘boundary recognized as a border between 2 things, such as the border between 2 countries’. While this explanation seems sensible, like the border between France and Germany, it does little to take into account places like Belgium and Switzerland, which are part French and part German without actually being either; therefore, the definition was later expanded to mean ‘a meeting place between 2 opposite entities’. If your geography is a bit rusty, here is an example that frequent travellers will understand: if you’re trying to use a European phone charger with a North American outlet, the only way it will work is if you use an adapter (aka interface) to match the plugs and convert the voltage.

Aside from plugs and European geography, interfaces make a lot of what we consider to be modern possible, such as global trade and technology.

In 2016, merchandise exports of WTO members reached a value of almost USD 16 trillion; a significant part of what made this number possible was the Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, which is an internationally accepted interface designed to clarify communication and expedite trade.

As for technology, as global Internet usage increases – in Germany alone it has doubled in the last 7 years – it’s worth considering the interfaces that allow people to access information on a variety of devices, through a variety of wired and wireless connections, on a global scale; conversely, consider that it is the workable interface which allows us to transition from reading this on our TV screen, to a tablet, to a smartphone, to a desktop almost seamlessly.

The first known usage of the word can be found in James T. Bottomley’s work, Hydrostatics (1882), in which he defines the term, stating: “The term interface denotes a face of separation, plane or curved, between two contiguous portions of the same substance.” The more modern understanding of the term comes from Marshall McLuhan’s 1962 book, The Gutenberg Galaxy, where he writes that: “The interface of the Renaissance was the meeting of medieval pluralism and modern homogeneity and mechanism.”

And when it comes to the world of computers, the first usage and definition come from the 1964 Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences: “The collection of components which connects the analog and digital computers to each other, and which controls and converts the data, is generally termed the ‘interface’.”

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