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Scissors for cut. Underline anywhere. Paragraph justification. Copyboard for paste. Fill bucket for fill. These are intuitive for most people for whom they

by sien 8y ago

Scissors for cut. Underline anywhere. Paragraph justification. Copyboard for paste. Fill bucket for fill. These are intuitive for most people for whom they were targeted. Three bars for a menu is not intuitive.

dragonwriter 8y ago
I would argue they most of those are only intuitive from long use, and were no more obvious than three bars when introduced (though they were easy to learn and quicker to recognize than text, just like the menu convention.) In a few years, three bars will be just as intuitive to most users, and probably be the intuitive icon we use as a reference when complaining that the icon to switch on ranged machine-brain interaction instead of touch interface isn't as intuitive as established iconography.
roenxi 8y ago
Cut is a really terrible example though, because the entire naming of the 'cut' operation isn't intuitive. "Cut" is really "relocate-object-action-first-half" and "paste" is really "relocate-object-action-second-half". We don't have good words for that. The entire relocation object involves program state and that adds some extra complexity. Cut has a whole heap of connotations that don't relate to the editing "cut" operation. Google suggests incision, wound, to separate into parts, "remove (something) from something larger by using a sharp implement". Editing cut doesn't do any of this. There is a very specific link in that relocating text /could be/ thought of as snipping it off a page and pasting it somewhere else, except no-one would ever do that when writing seriously. They erase and rewrite. So the scissors icon links to the word cut, but cut itself is actually a mystery-meat operation where figuring it out is hard for users that aren't already savvy with interfaces. By extension, the scissors icon has no link to the actual operation that the button performs.
- slededit 8y ago
  Cut and Paste is really the same as cutting out a shape in construction paper and pasting it elsewhere. Its gone from its original location and can be put in a new one. The only place the metaphor fails is that you can paste multiple times. In image programs there is literally a white gap where to object was. Word processors would redo line breaks and hide the original location.
christophilus 8y ago
They're intuitive for me, now. I remember when I got my first Windows computer, and those icons baffled me.
- TeMPOraL 8y ago
  The first Windows I used, 3.11, had a built-in tutorial explaining all the weird stuff, including helping you become comfortable with using your mouse. I miss the days when software people cared about built-in user guides.
TeMPOraL 8y ago
Those are all icons that seem intuitive because they're consistently used for that for about as long as you're alive. They're all metaphors for what office workers in 60s-80s did. If you worked in a corporate office then, you might have had a shot at guessing the meaning correctly. Otherwise, they're just as arbitrary as hamburger menus. > Copyboard for paste. I don't even know what on Earth is a "copyboard". Is this some arcane tool from early XX-century newspaper office?

by sien 8y ago

dragonwriter 8y ago

I would argue they most of those are only intuitive from long use, and were no more obvious than three bars when introduced (though they were easy to learn and quicker to recognize than text, just like the menu convention.) In a few years, three bars will be just as intuitive to most users, and probably be the intuitive icon we use as a reference when complaining that the icon to switch on ranged machine-brain interaction instead of touch interface isn't as intuitive as established iconography.

roenxi 8y ago

Cut is a really terrible example though, because the entire naming of the 'cut' operation isn't intuitive. "Cut" is really "relocate-object-action-first-half" and "paste" is really "relocate-object-action-second-half". We don't have good words for that. The entire relocation object involves program state and that adds some extra complexity. Cut has a whole heap of connotations that don't relate to the editing "cut" operation. Google suggests incision, wound, to separate into parts, "remove (something) from something larger by using a sharp implement". Editing cut doesn't do any of this. There is a very specific link in that relocating text /could be/ thought of as snipping it off a page and pasting it somewhere else, except no-one would ever do that when writing seriously. They erase and rewrite. So the scissors icon links to the word cut, but cut itself is actually a mystery-meat operation where figuring it out is hard for users that aren't already savvy with interfaces. By extension, the scissors icon has no link to the actual operation that the button performs.

slededit 8y ago
Cut and Paste is really the same as cutting out a shape in construction paper and pasting it elsewhere. Its gone from its original location and can be put in a new one. The only place the metaphor fails is that you can paste multiple times. In image programs there is literally a white gap where to object was. Word processors would redo line breaks and hide the original location.

christophilus 8y ago

They're intuitive for me, now. I remember when I got my first Windows computer, and those icons baffled me.

TeMPOraL 8y ago
The first Windows I used, 3.11, had a built-in tutorial explaining all the weird stuff, including helping you become comfortable with using your mouse. I miss the days when software people cared about built-in user guides.

TeMPOraL 8y ago

Those are all icons that seem intuitive because they're consistently used for that for about as long as you're alive. They're all metaphors for what office workers in 60s-80s did. If you worked in a corporate office then, you might have had a shot at guessing the meaning correctly. Otherwise, they're just as arbitrary as hamburger menus. > Copyboard for paste. I don't even know what on Earth is a "copyboard". Is this some arcane tool from early XX-century newspaper office?