7 ms·

The old design makes easier to grasp things at a glance, especially in Control Panel. Each icon has a distinct shape and color, in contrast with Windows 10 Sett

by mopsi 5y ago

The old design makes easier to grasp things at a glance, especially in Control Panel. Each icon has a distinct shape and color, in contrast with Windows 10 Settings app that has much more abstract monochrome icons that are difficult to tell apart. Monochrome vector icons make things like dark mode easier to implement. Such small software shops like Microsoft unfortunately cannot afford to hire designers to do multiple sets of icons.

akandiah 5y ago
> Such small software shops like Microsoft unfortunately cannot afford to hire designers to do multiple sets of icons. I had to chuckle. I remember back in the Windows 3.11 days, there used be a separate monochrome set of icons for all Windows (and Microsoft) programs.
PostThisTooFast 5y ago
And yet Windows 95 (and all Windows from 3.1 to Vista) let the user set up global color schemes that were inherited by all applications. I set up a "dark" mode in the early '90s and used it until Microsoft inexplicably REMOVED the entire color-scheme editor... just as everyone started to realize how dumb inverse (black text on white) color schemes are.
- hulitu 5y ago
  Now they have light gray on white or dark gray on black. Talk about progress.
  - PostThisTooFast 5y ago
    MS, which advanced UI more than anyone else in the '90s, is now out wandering in the weeds. Sad.
- zwaps 5y ago
  hmmm dark mode gives me headaches. Why would dark text on light background be dumb?
  - PostThisTooFast 5y ago
    Because it's equivalent to reading text off the surface of a light bulb all day. Why would you want to do that?
JonathonW 5y ago
The new Windows 11 Settings icons are pretty fantastic— full color and lots of distinctive shapes. Unfortunately, we’ll probably be at Windows 20 before the last of the Windows 8-style monochrome icons finally finds its way out of Windows, because that’s how things go at Microsoft. (It’s harder than it used to be, but I’m pretty sure you can still find a few Windows 95-era icons hanging around, and there are definitely still some 2000 icons in there).
- _michaelll 5y ago
  You can find much more than just windows 95 icons, check this out https://ntdotdev.wordpress.com/2021/02/06/state-of-the-windows-how-many-layers-of-ui-inconsistencies-are-in-windows-10/ https://ntdotdev.wordpress.com/2021/02/06/state-of-the-windo...
  - adamrezich 5y ago
    excellent! I've been looking for a thorough examination of this for awhile. I'm glad it specifically showed moricons.dll, which I remember finding as far back as Windows 98 when looking for icons
  - JonathonW 5y ago
    moricons.dll (and a lot of the stuff you'll find in shell32.dll and elsewhere) is a compatibility relic; those icons are no longer used by Windows itself. There are still some lingering old icons in the UI, though. Also, many of the DOS applications with icons in moricons.dll probably still run in 32-bit Windows 10. NTVDM and DOS application support don't exist in 64-bit Windows, but they're still alive and well in 32-bit Windows (albeit an optional install, because MS would really rather people not still be using DOS applications in 2021).

by mopsi 5y ago

akandiah 5y ago

> Such small software shops like Microsoft unfortunately cannot afford to hire designers to do multiple sets of icons. I had to chuckle. I remember back in the Windows 3.11 days, there used be a separate monochrome set of icons for all Windows (and Microsoft) programs.

PostThisTooFast 5y ago

And yet Windows 95 (and all Windows from 3.1 to Vista) let the user set up global color schemes that were inherited by all applications. I set up a "dark" mode in the early '90s and used it until Microsoft inexplicably REMOVED the entire color-scheme editor... just as everyone started to realize how dumb inverse (black text on white) color schemes are.

hulitu 5y ago
Now they have light gray on white or dark gray on black. Talk about progress.
- PostThisTooFast 5y ago
  MS, which advanced UI more than anyone else in the '90s, is now out wandering in the weeds. Sad.
zwaps 5y ago
hmmm dark mode gives me headaches. Why would dark text on light background be dumb?
- PostThisTooFast 5y ago
  Because it's equivalent to reading text off the surface of a light bulb all day. Why would you want to do that?

JonathonW 5y ago

The new Windows 11 Settings icons are pretty fantastic— full color and lots of distinctive shapes. Unfortunately, we’ll probably be at Windows 20 before the last of the Windows 8-style monochrome icons finally finds its way out of Windows, because that’s how things go at Microsoft. (It’s harder than it used to be, but I’m pretty sure you can still find a few Windows 95-era icons hanging around, and there are definitely still some 2000 icons in there).

_michaelll 5y ago
You can find much more than just windows 95 icons, check this out https://ntdotdev.wordpress.com/2021/02/06/state-of-the-windows-how-many-layers-of-ui-inconsistencies-are-in-windows-10/ https://ntdotdev.wordpress.com/2021/02/06/state-of-the-windo...
- adamrezich 5y ago
  excellent! I've been looking for a thorough examination of this for awhile. I'm glad it specifically showed moricons.dll, which I remember finding as far back as Windows 98 when looking for icons
- JonathonW 5y ago
  moricons.dll (and a lot of the stuff you'll find in shell32.dll and elsewhere) is a compatibility relic; those icons are no longer used by Windows itself. There are still some lingering old icons in the UI, though. Also, many of the DOS applications with icons in moricons.dll probably still run in 32-bit Windows 10. NTVDM and DOS application support don't exist in 64-bit Windows, but they're still alive and well in 32-bit Windows (albeit an optional install, because MS would really rather people not still be using DOS applications in 2021).