General applicability

This technical report was written in support of the standard ANSI/ISA-101.01-2015, Human Machine Interfaces for Process Automation Systems, hereinafter referred to as ISA-101. The goal of this technical report is to provide guidance on how to implement the recommendations and the requirements described in the HMI Philosophy subclause (4.2.1) of the standard. It outlines potential approaches and provides specific examples that can be included in an HMI philosophy in order to properly manage the system standards, design, implement, operate, and continuous work processes lifecycle steps.

This technical report is not intended to be used as an organization’s HMI philosophy. Instead, it provides details as to the desirable content. The objective of this TR is to be the starting point for the development of an HMI philosophy document; it provides examples that can be used in an HMI philosophy. Annex A has an example table of contents (TOC), which can be used as a starting point in generating an HMI philosophy document.

NOTE: This technical report does not contain any mandatory (normative) requirements.

The HMI lifecycle

Figure 1 shows a diagram of the scope of an HMI lifecycle, reproduced from the ISA-101 standard. The development of an HMI philosophy, as one of the system standards, is an essential element of the lifecycle model.