GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 342876
New icon to use on panel
Last modified: 2006-08-15 16:41:29 UTC
I want to comment about the icon of Deskbar, it's is good, but not usefull. It has much colors, much gradients and details, when you look as a normal icon it's ok but to use on panel it's a little bit hard to understand what that icon means. Looking at Spotlight icon from Mac OS, the Spotlight has an icon very clean, 2 colors, a simple design, it's easy to look at that and understand what it does. So, i suggest to make another icon, more simple, clean, using two or three colors only. This icon is to use on panel and not to illustrate the project.
We had quite some discussion (internally) as to what icon to use. I think we are stuck with the current icon as far as logo goes. That doesn't mean that we can't simplify the small icon sizes however. The original reasoning behind the current logo was that deskbar is not about "searching" solely. The use is much broader, some people use it more like the minicommander applet, and yet others use it mainly for "activation" purposes for places, bookmarks and apps. Infact, searching is a very small part of deskbar - hence not just a looking glass as logo/icon. But the usual thing applies - mockups/patches/suggestions are always welcome :-D
Actually, when scaled to bigger sizes, the icon looks wonderful. It's got a nice flow, and the composition is great. Awesome job there, guys! Too bad a 24px icon doesn't do it justice. Maybe a more simplified version would make it stand out better. I'll try to come up with a mockup later, once GIMP has grown on me.
> Actually, when scaled to bigger sizes, the icon looks wonderful. It's got a > nice flow, and the composition is great. Awesome job there, guys! Thanks! > Too bad a 24px icon doesn't do it justice. Maybe a more simplified version > would make it stand out better. I'll try to come up with a mockup later, once > GIMP has grown on me. Cool, looking forward to see what you come up with. We have UI freeze 26/7-2006 so if you want it to be considered for 2.18 you need to get it ready at latest a few days before that.
Screw GIMP. I went ahead and made some buttons using Photoshop and Illustrator. Check 'em out Unlit state: http://www.flickr.com/photos/akrodha/174932534/ Lit state (for mouseovers): http://www.flickr.com/photos/akrodha/174932600/ They look a bit silly at such high resolutions, but they look better scaled down, especially at 24px thickness. I figured a white icon against a bold color would be more visible. I also made the arrow a bit bigger and moved it to the right. Hope it's ok that I fudged the icon around a bit. I can send you .psd and .ai files via email, which contain all the layers and paths—I made the white icon using pure vector paths so that it can be scaled infinitely. I'll be happy to perform any desired changes, no matter how miniscule. (But during the week I might be a bit busy with lectures and such.) Hope you guys like these icons as much as I like the Deskbar!
They look really cool :-D Unfotunately I cannot handle .psd or .ai files. Also we need them in SVG format (and/or png) for distribution with the program. I'm not 100% sure we can manually set the image on mouseovers (in any easy way). Gnome automatically adds brightening... Let's see what the other guys say about this...
I'm notifying the mailing list, to get some more feedback. I hope we can keep the conversation here though. - Easier to track that way. Cheers
I still have not found out about the manual prelighting, but we can use an icon in depressed state for the button mode UI... If you wanted to have a go at that :-D Cheers
OK. I'll work on an SVG version at some point, and I'll see what I'll come up with for a depressed-state button. As for the icon lighting, I never really seemed to notice it until now. Looks like GNOME takes care of all that, although most (but not all) panel items don't light up. Seems rather inconsistent, doesn't it? Then again the panel is a huge confederate mess anyway. (I still love it though.) Has anyone on the mailing list said anything so far? Any suggestions?
It just occured to me that it isn't that hard to do manual prelighting. We can just connect to "enter-notify" and "leave-notify" events and update the icon on those. This requires that the gnome panel doesn't preligt the button though - since I don't know how to disable that :-)
Well, as it stands, the Deskbar icon doesn't light up when moused over although the power button does, as well as the application launchers. (I run GNOME 2.14)
I've also asked the tango-artists for feedback, hopefully before the release.
I'm not sure what a better icon would be, but the white outline of the magnifier and arrow, shoved in a rectangle, isn't it. I think the current icon is ok. I really can't say what else it shoudl be instead.
Could you please be more specific? Is the design too boring? Does it lack sophistication? Does the icon feel unbalanced within the bounding rectangle? Maybe I could remove it? I'm open to constructive suggestions as well as uninhibited criticism. This icon is a work in progress. I'd ultimately like to increase visibility at low resolutions but somehow preserve the current icon's detail and appeal. This requires feedback, of which I've received very little, even though the pictures I put up on my Flickr account have been viewed over 40 times...
How many sizes is the current icon available in? Only a 48x48 SVG? How do you feel your icon preserves the detail of the current icon? It certainly doesn't for me. It loses a lot of color. Your icon also isn't really square, and doesn't sit well on a square canvas. The goal for icons is to have unique outer shapes whenever possible. I just don't like your icon at all. I don't like the rectangle. I don't like the single color of the glass/arrow. I don't like the anti-squareness of it.
Thanks for your opinion. I respect the fact that the rectangular shape might not be appealing for some, but I would like to point out that the bounds of the current icon aren't square either, as long as the panel is set at 36px or less. I also wanted to preserve the flow of the arrow coming out of the magnifying glass, which is sadly difficult to see in the current icon at low resolutions. I can produce an SVG file that scales to any size. I can change the proportions of the icon to make it more square. Or I can get rid of the rectangle background. I can also try to add detail and depth while maintaining high visibility at low resolutions. An alternative solution would be to use an austere, high-contrast icon at low resolutions and to use the original icon at high resolutions. I'm trying to get the ball rolling with ideas here...
Created attachment 70411 [details] Icons in various sizes In the package you can find icons for deskbar applet in scalable (optimized for 48x48 px size), 32x32, 22x22 and 16x16. The scalable is just the original icon (logo), slightly adapted and hinted for 48x48, the smaller sizes have simplified shapes especially the 22x22 and 16x16 one. Those icons are done trying to be in line with the original logo and following tango style guidelines. The license is GPL. Ciao
OMG !!one These icons are gorgeous, and at every size ! Let's merge this ASAP before we go further in the freeze. If someone with good internet access could do it, else wait for me to get mine..
(me too) OMG!!111one We should have these in. Who do we need to contact regarding ui freeze break?
Mikkel: could you please take care of this, we really need those for 2.16 ! We are in notification period, so you just have to announce the change to the release-team list and the i18n team (which addresses i don't know) i'm sure there is some info concerning notifications on the live.gnome.org webpage. Thanks a lo t!
Merged in CVS ! Thanks a lot for the 1337 icons
Raph: You da man. 'Man you've been hacking like a madman today!