Settings on a microwave are, I think, a terrible example. Most microwaves I've used are horribly over-encumbered.
I expect two dials on any microwave I use: Time, Power. Maybe a control to set the time, if it has a clock.
I don't disagree with your general point about tools being able to be reprogrammed, though. One of the reasons I loved Autocad as a tool is the Lisp interpreter that allows you to script and extend it. I think that's a perfect example of a professional, mainstream tool with a good API that non-programmers find useful (if only to run scripts they find).
Autocad has a very interesting GUI concept, not in that it's programmable (VBA existed in CorelDraw for years), in its dialogue mode: you click a circle, and it asks you of a center; you either click or type coordinates. Sadly, this mode is rare in non-CAD systems.
Solidworks used to work like that too, it's a delight to just start a line and keep on typing distance deltas in numbers and see stuff emerging without a single mouse movement.
Do you have any current examples of consumer level microwaves with that simple interface? I've been looking for exactly that sort of simple microwave, but I haven't been able to find any in my brief searches on the internet or in the large mart style stores.
Almost all the microwaves I see in Finland require that the user rotates the dial and off you go. With US microwaves I use the first 30s to scratch my head trying to figure out into witch category my food belongs to. But then again, the same happen with other devices as well: US products are full of settings and preconfigs.
