Tool Use

Roles: user, tool, task, skill, maintenance, extension, mastery

The relationship between a human agent and an instrument employed to accomplish work. Tool use involves selection, skill acquisition, ongoing maintenance, and the gradual extension of capability that comes with mastery. As a target domain, it is structured by metaphors that import social relationships (companionship, servitude, partnership) onto what is fundamentally a one-directional dependency between user and artifact.

As Source Frame (3)

• Boat Anchor → software-programs
• Golden Hammer → software-programs
• Network Socket → network-communication

As Target Frame (1)

• social-roles → An Instrument Is a Companion