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Does your 7 year old daughter know what a floppy disk icon does? I bet she does. Does she know what the floppy disk is though? Mine doesn't (12y/o). She just kn

by rytis 13y ago

Does your 7 year old daughter know what a floppy disk icon does? I bet she does. Does she know what the floppy disk is though? Mine doesn't (12y/o). She just knows that she needs to click it if she wants to save a file in an editor. Might as well draw a random squiggle and call it "save".

Alexx 13y ago
That's exactly why icons are useful. You speak and read english because you're brought up with it around you. You don't need to know the latin roots for a word to understand it's meaning. The root meaning of an icon is not important, just the fact that it's a 'random squiggle' that is universally recognised regardless of context is it's strength. You can remove all icons and just replace them with words such as 'save', but now you must translate them for all languages, and scanning for the word is slower. However, interfaces packed with random icons which have no recognisable meaning - that is a terrible anti-pattern.
- rytis 13y ago
  Yes, I agree, icons are much faster to recognise than words. But I think we're limited to only a handful of icons that are universally (??) recognisable. And now more often than not I find hovering mouse pointer over an icon just to find out what it does. How easy is to guess what these 3 icons do if you never used the tool before http://imgur.com/TclsCh2 http://imgur.com/TclsCh2 ?
  - mbesto 13y ago
    > But I think we're limited to only a handful of icons that are universally (??) recognisable. Wouldn't you argue that the floppy disk is a universally recognizable icon for saving? It's hardly misconstrued for something else, and with the exception of youth, it does make sense (without using it before) to a majority of the population.
prof_hobart 13y ago
> Does your 7 year old daughter know what a floppy disk icon does? Yes. >Does she know what the floppy disk is though? Possibly (she's into retro-gaming, and occasionally uses my Amiga). But it's not actually important because the icon means save. Anacronisms like that are a part of the way that language (both verbally and non-verbally) develop. I doubt that many people have ever written on a scroll. But using the word in the context of "scroll bar" isn't confusing as a result. >Might as well draw a random squiggle and call it "save". Except for the fact that we already have an image that means save that everyone understands. We could equally make up a brand new word for "scroll bar" to remove its anacronistic link, but what would be the point?
ahoy 13y ago
"Drawing a random squiggle" and assigning it a meaning is exactly how symbols work. Stopping your car at intersections has exactly nothing to do with red octagons inherently, its just a symbol that we've assigned a meaning to.
georgemcbay 13y ago
"Might as well draw a random squiggle and call it "save"" At this point there's really no reason to replace the floppy with a squiggle or anything else. It is a virtually universally understood defacto standard at this point, so unless there is a super compelling reason to stop (and I can't think of any) we should just keep using it regardless of whether anyone actually uses floppies anymore or not. That aside, "random squiggles" make terrible icons. There has to be some notable structure to an image for it to have meaning when it is placed alongside other images. Eg. if you had a "random squiggle" for save and a "random squiggle" for load, even if the squiggles were pretty different and were used consistently, most people would have a very difficult time remembering which is which if they were actually just random squiggles, and not something with a more clear & defined structure.

by rytis 13y ago

Alexx 13y ago

That's exactly why icons are useful. You speak and read english because you're brought up with it around you. You don't need to know the latin roots for a word to understand it's meaning. The root meaning of an icon is not important, just the fact that it's a 'random squiggle' that is universally recognised regardless of context is it's strength. You can remove all icons and just replace them with words such as 'save', but now you must translate them for all languages, and scanning for the word is slower. However, interfaces packed with random icons which have no recognisable meaning - that is a terrible anti-pattern.

rytis 13y ago
Yes, I agree, icons are much faster to recognise than words. But I think we're limited to only a handful of icons that are universally (??) recognisable. And now more often than not I find hovering mouse pointer over an icon just to find out what it does. How easy is to guess what these 3 icons do if you never used the tool before http://imgur.com/TclsCh2 http://imgur.com/TclsCh2 ?
- mbesto 13y ago
  > But I think we're limited to only a handful of icons that are universally (??) recognisable. Wouldn't you argue that the floppy disk is a universally recognizable icon for saving? It's hardly misconstrued for something else, and with the exception of youth, it does make sense (without using it before) to a majority of the population.

prof_hobart 13y ago

> Does your 7 year old daughter know what a floppy disk icon does? Yes. >Does she know what the floppy disk is though? Possibly (she's into retro-gaming, and occasionally uses my Amiga). But it's not actually important because the icon means save. Anacronisms like that are a part of the way that language (both verbally and non-verbally) develop. I doubt that many people have ever written on a scroll. But using the word in the context of "scroll bar" isn't confusing as a result. >Might as well draw a random squiggle and call it "save". Except for the fact that we already have an image that means save that everyone understands. We could equally make up a brand new word for "scroll bar" to remove its anacronistic link, but what would be the point?

ahoy 13y ago

"Drawing a random squiggle" and assigning it a meaning is exactly how symbols work. Stopping your car at intersections has exactly nothing to do with red octagons inherently, its just a symbol that we've assigned a meaning to.

georgemcbay 13y ago

"Might as well draw a random squiggle and call it "save"" At this point there's really no reason to replace the floppy with a squiggle or anything else. It is a virtually universally understood defacto standard at this point, so unless there is a super compelling reason to stop (and I can't think of any) we should just keep using it regardless of whether anyone actually uses floppies anymore or not. That aside, "random squiggles" make terrible icons. There has to be some notable structure to an image for it to have meaning when it is placed alongside other images. Eg. if you had a "random squiggle" for save and a "random squiggle" for load, even if the squiggles were pretty different and were used consistently, most people would have a very difficult time remembering which is which if they were actually just random squiggles, and not something with a more clear & defined structure.