A new early-warning feature was meant to flag, in time before the operation, that preparation was needed — for instance procuring special material or scheduling a vehicle from outside the regular production line — so it wouldn't get noticed too late and cause delays or sloppy work. That triggered a restructuring of the workstation configuration (edit dialog). Two design challenges, two surfaces.
The additional parameters of early warning made the edit dialog increasingly cluttered. Instead of tacking it on as another isolated field, I initiated a rearrangement with clear grouping — including the dependencies on existing settings.
On the monitor, early warning had to read as its own tile — noticeable enough not to be overlooked, but not so similar to existing signals that it gets confused with them. The new type element makes the already tight space problem (fixed space, no scrolling) even tighter.
For each AVO, the configurator decides whether it appears on the monitor as text or as an image. Both paths stay visible in the same dialog, even when only one is actively used — and both sets of settings are kept, even though only one ultimately counts.
Synthetic recreation of the config dialog · IDs, description, display text and vehicle codes fictional (original under NDA).
Before reaching the final solution above, the early-warning input went through two discarded intermediate stages.
Both intermediate stages anonymized and rebuilt · final solution see config dialog above.
So the configurator can always see at a glance what's been set up for this AVO, everything sits directly visible in a single dialog — without tabs that could hide settings.
Configurators are used to seeing all data, even when it's currently inactive. That's why the text and image sections aren't dynamically shown or hidden depending on which one is currently in use — both stay in place at all times.
"Relevant" sits as the only toggle at the very top of the dialog: if it's off, nothing appears in production — regardless of whatever else was configured below it.
A configured image overrides everything else in production. That priority is reflected in the dialog's order: image deliberately sits at the very bottom — last one wins.
The exotic marking sits inside the text group, not beside it — it only applies to text AVOs. Early warning depends on text, but not on image: both therefore sit together inside one frame and are set apart from the image section by an "or" divider.
At request, before the detailed design I investigated the fundamental directions and used AI to play through four design variants: integrated as an AVO entry with its own styling, as an AVO-style row in its own area, as a timed pop-up overlay, and as its own tile.
A distinguishable element right at the top of the existing AVO list — uses the existing structure instead of creating a new one.
Kept in the AVO-entry style but with its own design, placed directly above the AVO entries — closer to the list, but visibly set apart.
Free design within the existing tile grid, independent of the AVO list — as a standalone widget.
A brief overlay on top of the interface instead of a permanent element — closes automatically or on confirmation.
Vehicle model fictional (original under NDA) · four of several AI-generated design variants.
The goal was to integrate early warning as seamlessly as possible into the existing UI, without creating an additional visual system. Existing design elements were deliberately reused, and the typography kept consistent with the existing interface. The AVO typeface was adopted as the typographic basis, as was tile size M from the existing part-number format. This keeps early warning visually familiar and lets it fit into the existing tile grid. At the same time, early warning needed a clear distinguishing feature: a new chip/tag shows when the affected AVO will be reached. Depending on configuration, this shows either a countdown in vehicles or the target shift number. This way the format combines familiar UI building blocks with one targeted new piece of information that's decisive for early warning: how close is the relevant AVO in the production flow?
To clearly distinguish the AVO information from the part number, early warning was given a leading icon. Here too, the goal was not to create an entirely new visual pattern. As a recognition cue, an already-established symbol principle was reused: the "important" icon already used for AVO exotics. This gives early warning its own visual marker while staying within the existing visual language. That way the information reads at a glance as an important note about the AVO, while the part number remains clearly recognizable as its own, separate piece of information.
Since the number and occurrence of early warnings can't be predicted, the layout had to handle a flexible number of entries — without needing a separate tile for every notification. Instead of offering the usual three tile sizes S, M and L, I deliberately chose a fixed width of 2 columns. The default size of 2 × 1 fits up to two entries and covers the intended normal case. If more than two entries are configured, the tile automatically grows in height (e.g. 2 × 2, 2 × 3). That keeps the layout consistent while additional early warnings can still be shown, without cluttering the interface with individual tiles.
Placing early warning at the very top left was initially questionable to me: a notice about a vehicle that only becomes relevant five positions later isn't yet urgent for the operator currently working, and would still visually rank above the build information for the vehicle actually being worked on. As the affected vehicle gets closer, though, early warning's relevance grows: once it's only one vehicle away or already in the immediate vicinity, the operator needs to react accordingly. So the placement had to account not just for the information's spatial position, but above all for its time-based urgency in the workflow.
Three variants were investigated for the color, oriented on the existing UI color logic:
The color decision wasn't made in isolation, but evaluated against early warning's priority and its visual hierarchy relative to the other tiles. On that basis, the current decision landed on yellow. That creates strong recognition alongside other highlighted information, especially AVO exotics. At the same time, this decision raises an open question: the shared coloring puts both pieces of information on a similar visual level. It isn't yet conclusively settled whether AVO exotics and early warnings should be perceived as equally important, or whether one of the two needs to be prioritized more strongly. This hierarchy is therefore still to be tested and validated directly on the shop floor. Grey was discarded as too restrained once early warning was prioritized. Blue remains a possible alternative, since it allows for clear emphasis without immediately equating early warning with other warning or highlight elements.
I proposed graduated emphasis — from neutral color through accent to warning color, as the affected vehicle gets closer — as a solution to the placement's priority problem. The idea was deliberately discarded.
Instead of showing urgency through color, the content of the right-hand badge changes: if the affected vehicle is still several vehicles away, it shows the count with a car icon as a countdown. Once it's close enough, the same field instead shows the concrete position/reference number. The color — gold, dashed outline — deliberately stays the same throughout, clearly set apart from status and warning tiles with a solid border.
Vehicle model fictional, all project details anonymized under NDA.