Re: [Ayatana] Unity improvement for vision loss people

Symbolic icons are better used for functions or tasks within an app/application/program (which I here use interchangeably). The back button in a browser.

Who said the web browsers are broken? I use two to help stay organized. In one browser, I always have bookmarks, saved passwords and sessions, tabs, history, and auto fill for work, while in the other, I keep personal tabs, bookmarks, passwords, etc.

How will the user know which app is set a default anyway? What if they want to change it? Short of looking in the settings or haphazardly opening it to find out, there isn't one.

A good UI will balance form and function. You don't want to try and adapt function to fit form; if you have to go one way or the other, it's much better to sacrifice form for function. Symbolic icons are unintuitive and very confusing to new users, and they serve very little function since the current, branded icons are symbolic anyway.

On Jan 12, 2012 12:58 AM, "frederik.nnaji@xxxxxxxxx" <frederik.nnaji@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Thu, Jan 12, 2012 at 08:12, Jeremy Bicha <jbicha@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On 11 January 2012 18:27, frederik.nnaji@xxxxxxxxx

<frederik.nnaji@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> symbolic icons, not desaturated corporate branding icons.

It is a very bad idea for Canonical to tweak the Firefox logo, and
Mozilla is more of a non-profit than an "evil corporation". That
Firefox's logo is nearly unrecognizable in Mint 12 is not a good
thing. I don't believe Ubuntu can legally modify the Skype
logo/trademarks anyway, but it's a bad idea so let's not even consider
it.

agreed.
that's why we have symbolic icons which represent a functionality.
The functionality can then be executed by a branded app.
Think of the symbolic icon as a wrapper. That's foundation, platform, Unity, rather than "app".

So to be more specific, a functionality (application) maps to an executor:

www-browser - [firefox|epiphany|chromium|opera|...]
instant-messenger - [empathy|pidgin|ekiga|skype|trillian|...]

file-manager - [thunar|dolphin|marlin|nautilus|mc]

this way the last used "app" will be opened for the respective functionality by "default", when the symbol representing the functionality is clicked.

and: freedom of choice remains untampered with. branding and logo copyrights are unharmed.
to think "free" and "open" doesn't mean we should allow the chaos from the old notification area to bloom in the unity launcher, now that we put an end to it with symbolic indicator menus.

> does canonical want app developers to develop their UI or does Ayatana aim at developing it themselves?

Ubuntu developers maintain the platform or foundation including Unity;
Ubuntu app developers write cool programs that can run on Ubuntu. And
of course, not all Ubuntu developers are part of Canonical or the
Design team.

> remains the wording problem in the community.. what is "app" and is "app"
> different from "application"? and what does "application" mean?

I think you like philosophical rabbit trails. "App" is a nice, current
buzzword for a computer program, as you might install from a
smartphone app store.

my philosophical rabbit trail, explained:
In today's "buzzy" language, stuff is not defined precisely.
If you want to define a system interface on the other hand, you will need a precise-to-the-core language to do this.

If the wording used to define the system is not precise, the system's architecture will reflect this imprecision on all structural levels.
Imprecision is an advantage in many situations, especially where you need randomness and entropy.

It should be used deliberately, when defining an architecture, which will be used by millions of people for many hours of their lives.

"app" != "application"; application != unequal functionality

symbolic icon maps to functionality
branding icon maps to "executing implementation"

Anyway, back to the original topic. I'm glad that the original poster
was able to set up Ubuntu relatively easily with larger, more visible
icons. I agree that the launcher arrows are not obvious enough; maybe
the designers will try to make them better in the coming weeks.

i'm curious to find out what that will feel like..

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