T10243: Some KDE applications could use better icons

[Noah Davis]

ndavis added a comment.


  In T10243#206539 <https://phabricator.kde.org/T10243#206539>, @alex-l wrote:
  
  > Thank you for your replies. As I said I discussed a new icon for Activities time ago but Ivan decided to stay with the 3-dots one. I can't always be around to check that previous decisions aren't overwritten by others. Isn't up to others to check if there were previous discussions on an icon? The one on the Activities icon is somewhere here on Phabricator. Found: https://phabricator.kde.org/M90
  
  
  While I agree that we should look for evidence of previous decisions, we can't be expected to go back and look in random places for evidence of old decisions. Most of the git commit summaries for old icons don't even have useful information for understanding why they were designed that way and no links to old reviews. We haven't done icon mockup posts since I started, so nobody ever thought to look in the Mockups section for icons. It seems like it would save time to submit a patch with the proposed icons and make the decisions there instead of making a mockup and then making the patch. The primary advantages to doing it that way is that it keeps the discussion all in one place (unless some of it happens in a chat room) and gives the reviewers direct access to the SVGs that the icon author made.
  
  I'd like to point out that no real conclusion was made in the discussion of that mockup. You got stuck because one of the designers disapproved because of the similarity to the Windows 10 icon and nobody replied back. I'd also like to point out that the real problem with the activities icons (old and new) are not what they look like, but that Activities don't actually make much sense as a separate feature from Virtual Desktops. Users have been saying for a long time that one should be removed or merged with the other and my experience with attempting to design an activities icon also made that obvious to me (which was never committed, but I believe it influenced the one that was committed). It's just too difficult to make good icons for Activities //and// Virtual Desktops because they're too similar and the advantages of Activities are too abstract. Maybe it'll finally happen in the transition to Wayland.
  
  > I know the guidelines on Breeze icons could be improved, but when I joined they were even worse but as I said who reviewed the icons was way more selective.
  > 
  > The most important rule in my opinion in VDG was: don't change things just for the sake of changing. In fact the current Dolphin, Gwenview, System Settings and other icons were designed for personal use by me but other VDG members noticed them from my screenshots and asked to submit them, despite the rule of not changing things. It is a matter of attitude: if there is broad agreement to update an icon then proceed. If you are not sure, keep everything as it is, trusting the previous designers who probably took that decision for reasons.
  > 
  > One single person who gives the OK to update the icon for a core KDE app? It's the opposite of our previous attitude...
  
  We still don't change things just for the sake of changing. That phrase is really not useful because the reasons for change are almost never for the sake of change itself. Otherwise, we would have turned Plasma into a trendy art piece instead of trying to make usable software. Choosing to not change for the sake of changing is also not the same as choosing not to change things. A more useful saying would be "Don't rush and change thoughtfully", which is actually just saying the obvious, but it's still easy to forget when you lack experience and you've got a long list of problems to fix.
  
  Breeze is by no means perfect. While I respect the incredible amount of work done by the old designers, that means they aren't perfect, just like everyone else. The old icons have lots of problems, but are still what we base new icons on. **Breeze has a fundamental problem in that it wasn't designed well for use with the freedesktop.org icon specs**, which is why we have 32px monochrome and color icons used randomly in lots of 3rd party apps and even KDE apps. Every now and then a user or someone else points out an icon that doesn't make much sense (e.g., the plugins icon). There are lots of times when I'm not sure what to do, but there is an obvious problem with a bunch of old icons. I take a lot of time to figure out what to do and a lot of the time, there simply isn't enough usable material to work with inside our own bubble, so I (and others) have to look outside for inspiration.
  
  Your interpretation of the situation and your expectations are just not fair and even a little insulting.
  
  Anyway, we're very off topic now, but I just needed this opportunity to vent in response to someone else's vent.

TASK DETAIL
  https://phabricator.kde.org/T10243

To: ndavis
Cc: Leon0402, IohannesPetros, alex-l, starbuck, cullmann, IlyaBizyaev, arrowd, abetts, stikonas, knauss, mglb, filipf, mludwig, aacid, lesliezhai, elvisangelaccio, kossebau, trickyricky26, ndavis, yurchor, #kde_games, #ark, #kde_pim, #discover_software_store, #yakuake, #kate, #okular, #gwenview, #konsole, #kde_applications, #vdg, ngraham, cblack, konkinartem, ian, jguidon, hannahk, Ghost6, jraleigh, MrPepe, fbampaloukas, squeakypancakes, alexde, GB_2, crozbo, firef, alexeymin, skadinna, genaxxx, aaronhoneycutt, jriddell, mbohlender
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