This chapter discusses the analysis and the allocation of tasks to computers and to humans.
Often, it is naively assumed that tasks may be broken into independent elements and then assigned to either computer or human, based on accepted criteria.
The chapter clarifies why this is not realistic in the case of computer interaction.
The chapter discusses a form of human-computer allocation ideally suited for complex, emerging human-machine systems–namely, supervisory control.
Supervisory control provides a continuum of different mixes of human and computer for performing tasks, which makes clear why human-computer task allocation may change radically with time and/or circumstance.
Task allocation is generally taken to mean the assignment of various tasks that need to be done to resources, instruments, or agents capable of doing them or the allocation of such resources to tasks, which is equivalent.
Task allocation is an inherent part of system design.
Task analysis means the breakdown of overall tasks, as given, into their elements and the specification of how these elements relate to one another in space and time and functional relation.
This chapter concerns especially with the allocation of relatively complex tasks—ones necessarily involving sensing, remembering, decision-making, and acting—that use human and machine resources available and capable of performing these functions.