Display symbol
The display symbol has a pointed left side and a rounded right side, the outline of an old CRT monitor. It marks information shown to a person on a screen: an error message, a dashboard, an order confirmation page. It is a more specific kind of output, for when it matters that a person sees the result rather than receives a file or a printout.
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Create Your Flowchart FreeWhen to use the display symbol
Use it where the screen is the point: user-facing flows, software processes, and anything where a person must see a message before they can act. "Show the booking confirmation", "Display the validation error", "Show the order status".
Label it with what the person sees, not the screen's name: "Show the payment declined message" says more than "Error screen".
Display or output?
Both mark information leaving the process.
- Display: shown on a screen for a person to read now.
- Output (parallelogram): any information leaving, by any route.
- Document (wavy bottom): a document, printed or electronic.
- In a business process flowchart, the parallelogram is usually enough. The display symbol is more at home in charts of software behavior.
The display symbol in ProcessFlowchart.app
Set a row's Shape column to Display and the symbol is drawn in place and connected for you.
Frequently asked questions
What does the display symbol mean in a flowchart?
Information shown to a person on a screen, such as a message, a confirmation page or a dashboard.
Why does the display symbol look like that?
It is a stylized cathode-ray tube monitor: a curved screen on one side and the tapering tube on the other. The symbol dates from early computer flowcharting.
Do I need the display symbol in a process flowchart?
Rarely. Use it for user-facing or software flows where seeing the screen matters. Otherwise the output parallelogram, or a plain rectangle, is clearer to most readers.
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