Editing Transparency (human–computer interaction) (section)

{{Short description|Term in human–computer interaction}}
{{unreferenced|date=October 2021}}

Any change in a [[computing]] system, such as a new feature or new component, is '''transparent''' if the system after change adheres to previous  [[interface (computing)|external interface]] as much as possible while changing its internal behaviour. The purpose is to shield from change all systems (or human users) on the other end of the interface. Confusingly, the term refers to overall ''invisibility'' of the component, it does not refer to ''visibility of component's internals'' (as in [[white box (software engineering)|white box]] or [[Open system (computing)|open system]]). The term ''transparent'' is widely used in computing marketing in substitution of the term ''invisible'', since the term ''invisible'' has a bad [[connotation]] (usually seen as something that the user can't see, and has no control over) while the term ''transparent'' has a good connotation (usually associated with not hiding anything). The vast majority of the times, the term ''transparent'' is used in a misleading way to refer to the actual invisibility of a computing process, which is also described by the term ''opaque'', especially with regards to data structures.{{cn|date=July 2020}} Because of this misleading and counter-intuitive definition, modern computer literature tends to prefer use of "[[wikt:agnostic|agnostic]]" over "transparent".

The term is used particularly often with regard to an [[abstraction layer]] that is invisible either from its upper or lower neighbouring layer.

Also temporarily used later around 1969 in IBM and Honeywell programming manuals{{Citation needed|date=July 2007}} the term referred to a certain [[computer programming]] technique. An application code was transparent when it was clear of the low-level detail (such as device-specific management) and contained only the logic solving a main problem. It was achieved through [[encapsulation (computer science)|encapsulation]] – putting the code into modules that [[information hiding|hid]] internal details, making them invisible for the main application.