Re: [libreoffice-design] MimeType icons - Base
Hi Ivan, Christoph, all, Ivan M. schrieb: Hi Christoph, all, On Wed, Jan 12, 2011 at 12:14 PM, Christoph Noack wrote: Hi all! [...] I tried to "play around" with the Base icon during the last two days, but it is pretty difficult. I fell back to the original "stack" idea, since it is rather hard to include all the database relations and the objects and keeping a unique and easy-to-identify look. [...] Now, I'm curious how you perceive the "background" idea for the 128px icon. I've added it to get a more or less harmonic style ... considering Writer and Calc. Unfortunately, the icons start to differ given their level of detail (per size). Before I get into feedback mode, I want to say thank you for continuing to work on these icons - it's great to see the progress! Now, let's switch to feedback mode: I'm not sure that the binary background works well as a metaphor. Of course, everything on computers is, in the end, binary, but AFAIK, Base involves no more or less binary than Writer, Calc, Draw ... at least, I hope it's a program people can use without touching binary! Maybe some SQL code could be used instead (CREATE TABLE ... SELECT * FROM)? Two thoughts about the SQL code: - We don't use readable text on any other icon. I would like to leave it. - Base is rather a database front-end, while I think SQL code is more like a reference to a database in general. What I tried out is to replace the binary background by a table of records / datasets: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/File:Base_alternative_icon_proposal.png I don't know if you consider it to be too near to the spreadsheet icon - In my eyes it different enough for a background with accent on the content in opposition to the borders in Calc. I also think the 128x128 version adds some unnecessary complexity by making space between the stacked cylinders... maybe add a fourth one instead? Christoph replaced this already in his proposal. To really nitpick, I wonder if the 48x48 icon couldn't have a slightly thicker border for the stack as it looks very thin against the thick outer border of the icon. Does it look better now? As for the colors, I wonder if we couldn't find a compromise between colorless and colorful icons by changing the color of the inner border (which is gray in the colorless version). What I mean is: having a gray or white inner border like the colorless icon coupled with the colored gradient fill of the colorful icon? What do you think? This doesn't work with the present icons, as the colorless inner area is just a semi-transparent gradient on the grey background. Adding the color back to the the inner border would mean to re-establish the colorful inner area as well. When the first version of the icons is ready, we can try to separate the inner area from the inner border. Best regards Bernhard -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ *** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***
Re: [libreoffice-design] MimeType icons - Base
Well thought I'd at least end on something - actually I have 3 images but viewing could cause harm - so let me just tell what came mind when I read your earlier emails about a Base Icon. I tried to add 3 elements: A display element such as those found on a checkout terminal in your grocery store, or perhaps a gas pump - as a front end tool like Base is going to be used to get to data that comes from some other system. A 10 key pad, just the keys - forms and workflow are really about data entry efficiency and data quality, nothing says that, well in the old school maybe, better then the image of the professional 10 key operator. Lastly - I attempted to create a mythical piece of office equipment, half CRT and half paper - the bottom being a video display w/ frame and a button, dark background withe text and you travel up it changes to a white background, black text and tops with a little crimp to shat is now paper - this for the report functions. Anyway - doesn't really work for an Icon and you guys are well along, maybe fil it - circular file maybe - and it might pique an idea from you in the next iteration. Thanks Drew -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ *** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***
Re: [libreoffice-design] MimeType icons - Base
Hi Christoph, all, On Wed, Jan 12, 2011 at 12:14 PM, Christoph Noack wrote: > Hi all! > > Am Sonntag, den 09.01.2011, 00:26 +0100 schrieb Bernhard Dippold: >> (who starts working on the Draw document icon) >> >> If anybody else would try his/her skills on the Master Doc (just put >> the >> symbols of four Writer icons or the full icons together on the main >> application icon), this would already help a lot! > > I missed that, so there is plenty of opportunity to others ... the > Master Doc is also pretty important, I think. > > I tried to "play around" with the Base icon during the last two days, > but it is pretty difficult. I fell back to the original "stack" idea, > since it is rather hard to include all the database relations and the > objects and keeping a unique and easy-to-identify look. > > However, here is the intermediate result ... the templates (are there > any, didn't check ... no, seems not), and the High Contrast versions are > missing. But, I added the original "colorful" version, and the Nik based > "colorless" style. Personally, I prefer the latter ... otherwise Base > reminds me of (delicious) candy. > > Now, I'm curious how you perceive the "background" idea for the 128px > icon. I've added it to get a more or less harmonic style ... considering > Writer and Calc. Unfortunately, the icons start to differ given their > level of detail (per size). Before I get into feedback mode, I want to say thank you for continuing to work on these icons - it's great to see the progress! Now, let's switch to feedback mode: I'm not sure that the binary background works well as a metaphor. Of course, everything on computers is, in the end, binary, but AFAIK, Base involves no more or less binary than Writer, Calc, Draw ... at least, I hope it's a program people can use without touching binary! Maybe some SQL code could be used instead (CREATE TABLE ... SELECT * FROM)? I also think the 128x128 version adds some unnecessary complexity by making space between the stacked cylinders... maybe add a fourth one instead? To really nitpick, I wonder if the 48x48 icon couldn't have a slightly thicker border for the stack as it looks very thin against the thick outer border of the icon. As for the colors, I wonder if we couldn't find a compromise between colorless and colorful icons by changing the color of the inner border (which is gray in the colorless version). What I mean is: having a gray or white inner border like the colorless icon coupled with the colored gradient fill of the colorful icon? What do you think? Regards, Ivan. -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ *** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***
Re: [libreoffice-design] MimeType icons - Base
On Wed, 2011-01-12 at 21:05 +0100, Christoph Noack wrote: > Hi Drew! > > Am Dienstag, den 11.01.2011, 18:47 -0500 schrieb drew: > > On Wed, 2011-01-12 at 00:14 +0100, Christoph Noack wrote: > > > I tried to "play around" with the Base icon during the last two days > [...] > > > > The important part to me is to stop portraying Base as a database, > > because it is not - from working with hundreds or more of users with > > Base those that thought of it as a database had very bad experiences > > (meaning the Schema management and such) those that approached it as > > what it was designed for, a form/report management tool had much better > > experience. > > > > It would be nice for the icon to emphasis the form/report functions and > > IMO get away from the idea it is a RDBMS. > > > > I have a very crude idea for a base icon - I'll put it to an image and > > pass it along - it would only be to try and pass along my general ideas. > > Oh yes, please do this ... and don't mind about the quality, it may even > be a pencil sketch. It's about getting the idea :-) Howdy Christoph, That may be the best solution, although I was ready to revert to a textual description after a quick try. > > Of course, we will have to provide something, so that our recent OOo > users feel comfortable. And - like you - I'd like to set the right > expectations, since the report functionality is rather limited (if you > don't have the extension). Ah yes reporting without report builder - it is limited unless you can write SQL in which case it becomes...lol...less limited...ok good point. Report builder offers something more then just the added features however - the work flow in Base is horrendous, mostly because the basic work flow in OO.o was horrendous from the stand point of being efficient with designing forms and reports, the same is true for data transfer between Base and Calc. Base is slamming of these large building blocks of functionality from the older StarOffice designs together in a new way, and it didn't work out so well. Report builder was free, to a much larger extent, to do things differently. Anyway that has little to do with an icon design. I'll try the sketching, or send my little idea along in text, either way tonight and don't let it slow you down from you are doing already. Thanks Drew -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ *** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***
Re: [libreoffice-design] MimeType icons - Base
Hi Drew! Am Dienstag, den 11.01.2011, 18:47 -0500 schrieb drew: > On Wed, 2011-01-12 at 00:14 +0100, Christoph Noack wrote: > > I tried to "play around" with the Base icon during the last two days [...] > > The important part to me is to stop portraying Base as a database, > because it is not - from working with hundreds or more of users with > Base those that thought of it as a database had very bad experiences > (meaning the Schema management and such) those that approached it as > what it was designed for, a form/report management tool had much better > experience. > > It would be nice for the icon to emphasis the form/report functions and > IMO get away from the idea it is a RDBMS. > > I have a very crude idea for a base icon - I'll put it to an image and > pass it along - it would only be to try and pass along my general ideas. Oh yes, please do this ... and don't mind about the quality, it may even be a pencil sketch. It's about getting the idea :-) Of course, we will have to provide something, so that our recent OOo users feel comfortable. And - like you - I'd like to set the right expectations, since the report functionality is rather limited (if you don't have the extension). And, as I said before, at the end we also have to consider the "uniqueness" of the icon - that is (here) a bit more important than to be totally correct. MSO 2010 for example, switched back to "simple" letters (user research based change, according to MS). Looking forward ... Cheers, Christoph -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ *** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***
Re: [libreoffice-design] MimeType icons - Base
On Wed, 2011-01-12 at 00:14 +0100, Christoph Noack wrote: > I tried to "play around" with the Base icon during the last two days, > but it is pretty difficult. I fell back to the original "stack" idea, > since it is rather hard to include all the database relations and the > objects and keeping a unique and easy-to-identify look. > > The important part to me is to stop portraying Base as a database, because it is not - from working with hundreds or more of users with Base those that thought of it as a database had very bad experiences (meaning the Schema management and such) those that approached it as what it was designed for, a form/report management tool had much better experience. It would be nice for the icon to emphasis the form/report functions and IMO get away from the idea it is a RDBMS. I have a very crude idea for a base icon - I'll put it to an image and pass it along - it would only be to try and pass along my general ideas. Thanks Drew -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ *** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***
Re: [libreoffice-design] MimeType icons - Base
Hi Christoph, all, Christoph Noack schrieb: Hi all! Am Sonntag, den 09.01.2011, 00:26 +0100 schrieb Bernhard Dippold: (who starts working on the Draw document icon) If anybody else would try his/her skills on the Master Doc (just put the symbols of four Writer icons or the full icons together on the main application icon), this would already help a lot! I missed that, so there is plenty of opportunity to others ... the Master Doc is also pretty important, I think. I tried to "play around" with the Base icon during the last two days, but it is pretty difficult. I fell back to the original "stack" idea, since it is rather hard to include all the database relations and the objects and keeping a unique and easy-to-identify look. As I thought you would work on the Impress icons, I too had a look at Base, but my results are quite similar: It becomes too detailed, if we include too much information. The present state of my work (uploaded to the wiki [1]) contains a bold lined Base icon, comparable to Writer. In-between there was another version with a form and a report added to the symbol - while the form might be understandable (at least I think so), the report doesn't work at all. But if you want to have a look (or use it as resource for additional work), I uploaded it too [2]. [...] Now, I'm curious how you perceive the "background" idea for the 128px icon. I've added it to get a more or less harmonic style ... considering Writer and Calc. Unfortunately, the icons start to differ given their level of detail (per size). I had similar thoughts about the "0" and "1" as representing the content of a database. But I turned away, because the users will not think about this kind of content: The recordsets they store in a database are mainly texts or numbers - related one to another in different ways. The binary representation is rather something for people deeply involved in computer structure, perhaps source code... Comments appreciated, of course! http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/3bH3699NZy4_amlco6XwzQ?feat=directlink [1]: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/File:LibreOffice_Initial_Icons_Bernhard_draft_0-1.svg [2]: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/File:Initial_Base_Idea_Bernhard.svg PS: Christoph, would you mind licensing your work under the triple license in the wiki (CC-by-sa, LGPL and MPL)? I had to stick to CC-by-sa because my work is based on yours. For easier inclusion of the resulting images it might be worth while to license all the steps to this result in a license that allows inclusion of the work directly in LibO without getting approval by every single contributor... -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ *** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***
Re: [libreoffice-design] MimeType icons - Base
Hi all! Am Sonntag, den 09.01.2011, 00:26 +0100 schrieb Bernhard Dippold: > (who starts working on the Draw document icon) > > If anybody else would try his/her skills on the Master Doc (just put > the > symbols of four Writer icons or the full icons together on the main > application icon), this would already help a lot! I missed that, so there is plenty of opportunity to others ... the Master Doc is also pretty important, I think. I tried to "play around" with the Base icon during the last two days, but it is pretty difficult. I fell back to the original "stack" idea, since it is rather hard to include all the database relations and the objects and keeping a unique and easy-to-identify look. However, here is the intermediate result ... the templates (are there any, didn't check ... no, seems not), and the High Contrast versions are missing. But, I added the original "colorful" version, and the Nik based "colorless" style. Personally, I prefer the latter ... otherwise Base reminds me of (delicious) candy. Now, I'm curious how you perceive the "background" idea for the 128px icon. I've added it to get a more or less harmonic style ... considering Writer and Calc. Unfortunately, the icons start to differ given their level of detail (per size). Comments appreciated, of course! http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/photo/3bH3699NZy4_amlco6XwzQ?feat=directlink Cheers, Christoph -- Unsubscribe instructions: E-mail to design+h...@libreoffice.org List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/www/design/ *** All posts to this list are publicly archived for eternity ***
