this post was submitted on 28 Mar 2026
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TenForward: Where Every Vulcan Knows Your Name
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Re-route power to the shields, emit a tachyon pulse through the deflector, and post all the nonsense you want. Within reason of course.
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Being able to rearrange a control panel to individual people's preferences means each station can be tailored for different needs, even different species and abilities. You give up the consistency, where someone can tell you exactly where the right button is, but it's far more accommodating during day-to-day operations about the ship.
That said, I hate it. Give me dials and buttons any day of the week. I could do without the 10,000 indicator lights though. Engineering in old starship just looks like a Gik'tal concert.
I remember an officer chastising another crewman for using a non-standard interface. ~~I think it was Worf in TNG.~~ Edit: Worf, yes, but DS9. S04E07, "Starship Down"
I also remember a blinded Tuvok activating a tactile interface at his station. (VOY, S04E08, "Year of Hell")
In the context of star trek thats no excuse. They could easily integrate a little replicator into the panels for customizable tactile interfaces. Like you get on duty, select your specific customized interface profile, wait the ∼5 seconds for the old one to be reclaimed and the new one to materialize and you're good to go. They can keep the standard panel interface right next to it just in case.
5 seconds? You need your matter conversion matrix realigned if it's taking that long.
I've been trying to get starfleet to approve mini-replicators in control panels for years but I always get the same "it's just not worth the materials cost" but honestly when was the last time you saw an Admiral use a control panel themselves?
Remember Microsoft's surface dial?
Just make a touch screen and a bunch of those.
You can make your own interface outta touchscreen and attachable doodads.
This is kind of how DynamicLand is. They use a system of projectors to create images next to objects, and color patterns to track object position and identity with cameras:
So, for example, you can place a keyboard next to a block of text to edit it.
There's more to DynamicLand than that, but that's what I'm reminded of.