GNOME Bugzilla – Bug 614640
new app icon for empathy
Last modified: 2011-08-29 10:12:43 UTC
I discussed this with Andreas Nilsson the other day (he made the current icon) and we agreed that it needs a new icon because the current icon: 1. is the Telepathy logo and Empathy is not Telepathy 2. doesn't make it very clear what it does 3. uses bodyparts which is against GNOME's and general icon guidelines. I was wondering if the Empathy developers are open to alternative application icon that the art team will create.
I'm not against using a new icon if you can provide an awesome one :)
Created attachment 157921 [details] empathy app icon Attached a proposal. I think it's fun, like IM should be, and it mixes with well with the GNOME icon style. I've yet to make a hires version. I hope you like it.
Very nice icon, but isn't a head a body part? :) My only real (personal) comment about it is that the eyebrows look like antennas, making the smiley head look like an ant :) May be they are too high?
Created attachment 157976 [details] empathy app icon (In reply to comment #3) > Very nice icon, but isn't a head a body part? :) it's a smiley face, those are fine. ;) > My only real (personal) comment about it is that the eyebrows look like > antennas, making the smiley head look like an ant :) May be they are too high? Moved them a few pixels down.
Sweet, I like it!
The icon looks fine but I'm not incredibly excited by it. Maybe we could have an icon related to audio/video chat as well? The current one still make me think about IM only.
While communicating how cool your app is in the icon is really important, trying to cram too many elements into it quickly becomes a mess. I think it looks like the current dude could be video/audio-chatting already.
Can we get a decision on this? The art folks would like to have a new icon for 3.0. :)
So, there are three big issues with the current logo that I see right now: * It's uses the logo of the Telepathy technology. * The only communication form it addresses does not work except in sci-fi movies. ;) It should communicate chat. * It lacks a 256x256 icon, making it look bad in the GNOME 3.0 Application launcher. Hylke's replacement icon addresses all these issuses.
Created attachment 181515 [details] Improved Highres rendering of the icon. (zipped) The attached version includes all the sizes for the bitmap, including the highres (256x256px) version exposed in the gnome shell app picker at larger size.
For the record, the proposed icon is http://people.collabora.co.uk/~cassidy/empathy-new-icon.png Tbh I'm not really convinced. That's probably because I'm emotionally attached to the current icon. The proposed one looks nice but is maybe a bit "agressive" and the mic/webcam images won't be visible in smaller sizes. Actually I quite like the current logo and I don't think it's that bad. (In reply to comment #9) > So, there are three big issues with the current logo that I see right now: > * It's uses the logo of the Telepathy technology. That doesn't really matter from an user pov which won't know about Telepathy anyway. > * The only communication form it addresses does not work except in sci-fi > movies. ;) It should communicate chat. Mayyyyybe; but I don't think it's so a big deal. > * It lacks a 256x256 icon, making it look bad in the GNOME 3.0 Application > launcher. I just pushed a 256x256 version of the icon so that will be fixed in next release.
Also, Yahoo! Messenger uses smiley as its icon, I'd prefer to differentiate from it: http://webmessenger.yahoo.com/
For the record, when I asked on #empathy about this new icon, any of the Empathy developpers liked it either... :\
(In reply to comment #13) > For the record, when I asked on #empathy about this new icon, any of the > Empathy developpers liked it either... :\ Well, we can make it better. it doesn't have to be this icon per say, but we need some feedback so we can improve it or maybe use something else. Another argument for a change is that Empathy is part of the core GNOME apps, which should try to be generic, integrated, and not care branded too much.
Rendering the SVG into 256x256 does not fix the issue. The issue is that the logo for the underlying library isn't exactly appropriate for the IM application and that Empathy lacks the highres variant[1] of the launcher icon. [1] http://tango.freedesktop.org/Tango_Icon_Theme_Guidelines#X-Large
Created attachment 181585 [details] new iteration of the app icon As discussed on IRC, this is not an identity replacement, just an improved app icon with highres variant included. The SVG in the tarball is means as a 'source' not meant to be installed.
Sorry for offtopic :) 1. Click: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TPFRZDotAQc 2. Pause at 1:38 3. Compare with Empathy's logo 4. ... 5. Profit
Created attachment 181603 [details] Slightly improved icon
(In reply to comment #18) > Created an attachment (id=181603) [details] > Slightly improved icon this is a new meme... :)
[Removing GNOME3.0 target as decided in release-team meeting on March 03, 2011. "nice-to-have" categorisation for GNOME3.0]
There is a finished icon attached we agreed upon on IRC. Why would this be punted into the future?
Jakub, it is not punted and there was nothing refused here. It just will not block the GNOME3.0 release if it is NOT fixed until then, nothing else. :-)
Hey folks, can we still get this in?
I have a branch integrating this new icon: http://git.collabora.co.uk/?p=user/cassidy/empathy;a=shortlog;h=refs/heads/new-icon-614640 The only thing I need is a svg version for hicolor_apps_scalable_empathy.svg Could you please provide one? I'm sure it's pretty easy to do using the existing svg but I really suck at inkscape.
(In reply to comment #24) > The only thing I need is a svg version for hicolor_apps_scalable_empathy.svg > > Could you please provide one? I'm sure it's pretty easy to do using the > existing svg but I really suck at inkscape. Oh, I've just been told that we shouldn't ship the svg any more, forget that then. :)
The high res (256x256px) replaces the former scalable SVG. The amount of detail and the use of effects makes it not viable to install as SVG. There isn't a solid caching mechanism in place and rsvg isn't able to render it accurately and fast currently. If we ever bump into a situation where 256 is not enough, we can raise the bar.
Still, it would be good to have the SVG in the source tree.
Merged to master. Thanks a lot for your work guys! This problem has been fixed in the development version. The fix will be available in the next major software release. Thank you for your bug report.
(In reply to comment #27) > Still, it would be good to have the SVG in the source tree. Yeah, I commited it as well but it won't be installed.
(In reply to comment #28) > Merged to master. Are any screenshots in the documentation affected by this? (UI Freeze.)
Thanks for fixing :)
(In reply to comment #30) > (In reply to comment #28) > > Merged to master. > > Are any screenshots in the documentation affected by this? (UI Freeze.) These 2 files should be updated: http://git.gnome.org/browse/empathy/plain/help/C/figures/empathy-logo.png http://git.gnome.org/browse/empathy/plain/help/C/figures/empathy-main-window.png I'll send a mail to the doc list in a bit.