Notices

This week I got the suggestion by someone that we should focus on icons. I'm not a graphic artist myself, but I know there are lots of helpful and able designers on this forum - it's your chance to help out here and make the UI more prettier.

We do not concentrate so much on layout and text, but directly on the icons. Here's a draft of how it could look like (suggestions always welcome):

• Browse the app menu and find apps without icons ("blue square")
• Browse HAM ("App. manager") in the "Uninstall" view and find apps with no icons / bad icons / icons that are too small / icons that are not "cut out correctly"; also check if command-line apps have the "$" in the upper left corner
• Find icons in use inside applications (toolbars, buttons, etc..) - check that they fit the general style of icons in the UI and if they appear "sharp" (not blurry)

Designers should then help out with fixing the icons or creating new ones and sending them to the application maintainer who can then hopefully easily replace the icons without having to do much coding.

Icon sizes are documented here:

App manager icon size: 48x48
Task manager icon size: 64x64

Please also make sure to re-use existing icons in the icon theme (or from other applications) if they describe the same behaviour/action (e.g. the "share" icon, general_add, etc..). You can find the icons in /usr/share/icons/

Add application/menu icons to this wiki page where we can more easily track progress (also upload new icons there and change the status if you are working on icons: http://wiki.maemo.org/UX/Icons

Let me begin with the apps I've installed.

App menu (edit: I've added these to http://wiki.maemo.org/UX/Icons now)
Brain Party - Blurry icon, square without rounded edges (new icons are on the way)
Numpty Physics - Icon looks blurry, "dirty" in upper left corner
GLtron - Pixelated bike - definitely needs rework
Fahrplan - A good metaphor, but it's blurry
liqflow - Also a good metaphor, but again blurry (some alpha blending on the edges might look good, too?)
Wiicontrol - A very cool app, but it's missing an application icon (maybe the upper part of the WiiMote? Or the WiiMote as a whole?)

(As a short side node, the emulators have really good, high-quality icons - I really like all of them!)

App manager
Brain Party - too small; but is already being fixed (see above)
Extra Decoders Support - White square background - the white could be transformed to be transparent
Fahrplan - the icon looks a bit blurry - at least at the edges
Feedhandler - Missing an icon (a RSS icon or something would be nice)
FeedingIt - Good icon, but too small
GLtron - Same problem as Extra Decoders Support: White rectangle background that could be transparent
Headphone Daemon - Icon too small; maybe it could also have a better metaphor (right now, it's a bus because headphoned prevents "public transport situations")
Jamaendo Player - Icon too small
liqflow - Icon missing
Mapper - Icon too small
MPlayer - Icon missing
Numpty Physics - Icon looks blurry
OpenSSH - Client, server and "client and server" packages - all of them have a icon that's too small and that has a white square background that should be transparent
Panucci - Icon too small
Petrovich - Icon missing
rootsh - Icon missing
Simple Brightness Applet - Icon missing
Theremin - Icon too small
Unzip add-on for the FM - Icon missing
vncviewer - Icon too small; could have white background (or get rid of the white lines above and below?)
Wiicontrol - Icon missing (see above)

Well, I'm willing to lend hand on designing some of these, as soon as I get back home, I'll see about it.

I've now populated the wiki page with some icons + description in a nice table: http://wiki.maemo.org/UX/Icons

This should hopefully make it easier to track progress and see a comparison of current icons and proposed icons. Please set the status to TAKEN if you are working on an icon, then upload both sizes to the wiki, link them from the page and set the status to FINISHED and then contact the application maintainer. If you have found another app with bad/missing icons, please add the current icon and a short description to the table as "NEW".

Thank you THP - very much appreciated!

I'm not the greates at icons eitehr, but i would lvoe to see some of them redone. I'm not going as far as to suggest minimum standards, but i hope you all agree, some standards are useful! - nice icons, make more a nice desktop etc

Following on from THP's List, They are a good set to focus on
Will go away and try and come up with some suggestions/solutions

Would also be helpful to mail any authors if you want them to assist in either replacing/agreeing/commenting etc!!

My thoughts. All of these are from application manager.

No icons at all:

• Call forwarding applet
• Custom Operator Name Widget
• KMPLayer
• liqtorch
• maemo-geolocation
• maemo-org
• nmap
• orrery
• Pidgin Language Support
• proximityd
• pypianobar
• worldtv99

Icons that are blurry:

• cpumem-applet

Icons that could be larger:

• anarchism
• belltower
• DateJinni
• DiceJinni
• DiskUsage
• eCoach
• EightyOne
• Extended Call Log
• FindMine
• free42
• freecell4maemo
• Gboggle
• GiveMeFive
• Gnuplot
• GPSJinni
• htop
• Irssi
• Kandis (also too dark so can't see outline against dark backgrounds)
• Mad Bomber
• maelstrom
• MathJinni
• MGutenberg E-Book Reader
• Mirror
• MMagnetic
• nspeed
• Ogg Support
• OMWeather database for gismeteo.ru
• PackageView
• Password Safe
• Pidgin Extra Protocols (Bonjour and Sametime)
• Pidgin Internet Messenger
• Pidgin Status Menu Plugin for Maemo 5
• PushIt
• Puzzle Collection
• QStarDict
• Recorder
• robotfindskitten
• RulerJinni
• Scopa
• Sharing Plugin for Picasaweb
• Simple FMTX desktop widget
• stopish
• TabletBridge (also too dark so can't see outline against dark backgrounds)
• Tennix 2009 World Tour
• Thai fonts
• The Milky Way Wallpaper
• TimerJinni
• Tuner
• tweakr
• ussd-widget
• Vagalume
• vncviewer
• WhoAmI
• WifiInfo (also too dark so can't see outline against dark backgrounds)
• Wormux
• xkblayouts-rx51-ru
• zoutube

Other problems, like icons that don't seem to match applications, or are unclear:

• AccDisplay: nice clean icon, but it looks like a synchronisation app icon rather than anything to do with accelerometers. Sorry I don't have any better ideas.
• Conky: Unsure why the icon is a person!
• Conversations Inbox Desktop Widget: Odd icon.
• Currency Converter
• Desktop Activity Manager
• Easy Chroot: Not sure what to suggest instead, though!
• QuickNote: bit too messy

This thread is right up my street, i used to make icons for s60 alot, i also used to mod alot of apps, change the apps UI etc, iv also made some icons for my N900 to match the Maemo 5 UI as i hate having dif style icons, will post some later and i will work on some new icons.

Im not sure how to add icons etc to the wiki page, i dont want to mess it up.

Here are my proposed icons for Unzip add-on for the FM ...



Regards,
Biggzy.

Thanks Bigzy.

Also scary to see just how many do not have icons :|
I can forgive the blurry ones, whilst the rest actually get icons! hehe
The wiki page is pretty hard to add images, i did try, but also wasn't sure....

Going to work on some this week and throw my two pence in in the middle of the week
All help is welcome

Nice, although maybe the blue square should look more like a folder icon?