What is feedback?
Feedback is information you get about how something performed or behaved. In tech, it’s a response that tells you whether a system, program, or device is doing what you expect, and often suggests how to improve it.
Let's break it down
Think of feedback as a loop: you do an action → the system reacts → it sends back a message (the feedback) → you use that message to adjust your next action. The loop can be visual (like a progress bar), auditory (a beep), or data‑driven (error codes, logs).
Why does it matter?
Feedback lets you know if you’re on the right track, helps catch mistakes early, and guides learning. Without it, you’d be guessing whether your code works, if a network request succeeded, or if a user liked your app.
Where is it used?
- Software development (compiler errors, test results)
- User interfaces (notifications, loading spinners)
- Hardware (LED indicators, vibration alerts)
- Networking (ACK packets, status codes)
- Machine learning (training loss, validation metrics)
Good things about it
- Speeds up problem solving by pointing out issues quickly.
- Improves user experience when users get clear, timely responses.
- Enables automation: systems can self‑adjust based on feedback loops.
- Encourages continuous improvement and learning.
Not-so-good things
- Too much feedback can overwhelm users (information overload).
- Poorly designed feedback may be confusing or misleading.
- Relying on feedback alone can hide underlying problems if the feedback itself is inaccurate.
- Implementing detailed feedback can add extra complexity and performance cost to a system.