On 18/12/2001 at 12:16 Ben Goodger wrote: >Actually he's making the case for the key usability benefit of this >feature. > No. He was being patronising.
An icon for a bookmark is not equivalent to an icon for a file type. The number of different types of file icon is quite small, and easily remembered by the user after some small amount of use. It also means an entirely different thing. It means I can use this file with the application that uses 'this' icon. Whereas a bookmark icon means what? The icon belonging to some site, or the owner of that site. Where is the semantic connection with the actual bookmark and the icon? How likely am I to remember amongst hundreds of other bookmarks what a particular icon is supposed to mean, and then for all of the icons that are from the same site how am I to differentiate between the different bookmarks? Its a feature which seems to be of use at first glance, that at greater thought seems useless except as an advertising medium. If that is its intent then say so, but don't pretend it really increases useablilty because in actual use it really won't except in those small cases where the user would remember the actual site anyway because it was so important. Simon . >Simon P. Lucy wrote: > >>On 18/12/2001 at 07:55 Jay Garcia wrote: >> >>>Have you ever peered at "File Types" in your File Associations list ?? >>>See the little icons to the left of the association ?? If you're looking >>>for a particular file-type association you can scroll the list looking >>>for the associated icon in the left column without having to read the >>>text. Same idea here when looking for bookmarks for instance .. get the >>>picture now? ;-) >>> >> >>Patronising people is such an easy thing to do. Especially if you haven't >>spent that much time really thinking about it. >>
