5 ms·

That's OK, we nowadays use icons that don't make sense to anyone at all. I mean how would you know that three horizontal lines was a "Hamburger menu", and if y

That's OK, we nowadays use icons that don't make sense to anyone at all. I mean how would you know that three horizontal lines was a "Hamburger menu", and if you do know that, why would you want a Hamburger?

eddieh 7y ago
Actually the icon looks like three menu items. It is a pretty good icon for signaling that it will open a menu. The hamburger nomenclature seems to be an ex pos facto name for something that rightfully should be called the menu icon.
- eitland 7y ago
  I can only speak for myself, but for me who grew up with C64, Windows 3.1, 95, 98, Linux, Windows XP more Linux etc that icon still didn't make sense until I got it explained. Then again, the magnifykng glass icon for search didn't make sense either until I read the docs but at least back then people made docs and kept the UI stable enough so that it made sense to learn it. I still remember fondly being good with OLE (Object Linking and Embedding) in a Microsoft Works.
  - collyw 7y ago
    The old days seemed so much more intuitive when there was a crappy low res icon with text underneath.
    - eitland 7y ago
      Not sure if you are sarcastic and in what way, but if I understand you correctly you think we are better off now. I think we would be better off if we kept the best from both: the predictability and discoverability of the past with the niceness of today. Why should we have to choose between nice and usable?
      - collyw 7y ago
        No I think that having a bit of descriptive text below an icon was far more useful than far prettier world of nicely rounded corners on hamburger menus that we have today.
- alxlaz 7y ago
  > the icon looks like three menu items It's a nondescript icon made of three horizontal bars, it looks like literally anything that comes in threes. My mom calls it the pancake button and my fourteen year-old nephew used to call it the button with something that looks like a fork but without a handle until he switched to the "meh" button once he became a nihilist (teenagers do that stuff sometimes). A menu with three items is very likely to be among the last things that crosses a non-techie's mind. At this point it's been used enough that anyone with enough exposure to electronics knows what it does, but it's hardly a better choice than the "File" menu. The point of making something intuitive, as opposed to explicit (i.e. by using a symbol as opposed to spelling out) is kindda missed if you need to "well actually" it and explain why it means whatever it means.
- collyw 7y ago
  I disagree. It took around two years of seeing hamburger menus before it clicked that it was a common symbol for a menu. Its getting worse and seems to be getting replaced by 3 vertical dots now.
  - eddieh 7y ago
    I just think of the 3 vertical dots as vertical ellipsis. I often use vertical ellipsis when making a list that continues. e.g. — History of Empire and Colonialism — History of Religion and Society — History of Race, Gender, and Power ⋮ — History of War and Society So it naturally means "there is more stuff here" to me. YMMV
    - collyw 7y ago
      In your context it does make sense. As a menu button it doesn't (to me at least).

eddieh 7y ago

Actually the icon looks like three menu items. It is a pretty good icon for signaling that it will open a menu. The hamburger nomenclature seems to be an ex pos facto name for something that rightfully should be called the menu icon.

eitland 7y ago
I can only speak for myself, but for me who grew up with C64, Windows 3.1, 95, 98, Linux, Windows XP more Linux etc that icon still didn't make sense until I got it explained. Then again, the magnifykng glass icon for search didn't make sense either until I read the docs but at least back then people made docs and kept the UI stable enough so that it made sense to learn it. I still remember fondly being good with OLE (Object Linking and Embedding) in a Microsoft Works.
- collyw 7y ago
  The old days seemed so much more intuitive when there was a crappy low res icon with text underneath.
  - eitland 7y ago
    Not sure if you are sarcastic and in what way, but if I understand you correctly you think we are better off now. I think we would be better off if we kept the best from both: the predictability and discoverability of the past with the niceness of today. Why should we have to choose between nice and usable?
    - collyw 7y ago
      No I think that having a bit of descriptive text below an icon was far more useful than far prettier world of nicely rounded corners on hamburger menus that we have today.
alxlaz 7y ago
> the icon looks like three menu items It's a nondescript icon made of three horizontal bars, it looks like literally anything that comes in threes. My mom calls it the pancake button and my fourteen year-old nephew used to call it the button with something that looks like a fork but without a handle until he switched to the "meh" button once he became a nihilist (teenagers do that stuff sometimes). A menu with three items is very likely to be among the last things that crosses a non-techie's mind. At this point it's been used enough that anyone with enough exposure to electronics knows what it does, but it's hardly a better choice than the "File" menu. The point of making something intuitive, as opposed to explicit (i.e. by using a symbol as opposed to spelling out) is kindda missed if you need to "well actually" it and explain why it means whatever it means.
collyw 7y ago
I disagree. It took around two years of seeing hamburger menus before it clicked that it was a common symbol for a menu. Its getting worse and seems to be getting replaced by 3 vertical dots now.
- eddieh 7y ago
  I just think of the 3 vertical dots as vertical ellipsis. I often use vertical ellipsis when making a list that continues. e.g. — History of Empire and Colonialism — History of Religion and Society — History of Race, Gender, and Power ⋮ — History of War and Society So it naturally means "there is more stuff here" to me. YMMV
  - collyw 7y ago
    In your context it does make sense. As a menu button it doesn't (to me at least).