Poll: My Documents Icon

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Which one you want the My Documents icon.

Poll ended at Sun Nov 08, 2015 3:28 pm

Current
11
52%
New #1
5
24%
New #2
5
24%
 
Total votes: 21

henrytang5247
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Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by henrytang5247 »

Last edited by henrytang5247 on Tue Nov 03, 2015 3:52 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Hi I am Henry. I often make Chinese and Malay translation and icons for ReactOS. I also a ReactOS Community Youtube Channel Manager.
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oldman
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by oldman »

How about making a different icon, with 2 or 3 sheets of paper inside the folder!

I don't care for the new or the old icon!
Please keep the Windows classic 9x/2000 look and feel.
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VoodooMystic
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by VoodooMystic »

oldman wrote:How about making a different icon, with 2 or 3 sheets of paper inside the folder!

I don't care for the new or the old icon!
Agreed on the idea of having papers in the folder.
henrytang5247
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by henrytang5247 »

Added paper...

See New #2..
Hi I am Henry. I often make Chinese and Malay translation and icons for ReactOS. I also a ReactOS Community Youtube Channel Manager.
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oldman
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by oldman »

henrytang5247 wrote:Added paper...

See New #2..
Very good, but! Could you get rid of the sheet of paper that is outside of the folder, plus, make the folder plain, without the house (which is on the old folder icon) on it.
Please keep the Windows classic 9x/2000 look and feel.
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They may help you with a problem, so do have a look at them.
Pi_User5
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by Pi_User5 »

I prefer the current icon. It fits much better.
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Swyter
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by Swyter »

Pi_User5 wrote:I prefer the current icon. It fits much better.
Agree, it's one of the best icons we have. I wouldn't change a pixel of that one.
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Pi_User5
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by Pi_User5 »

Swyter wrote:
Pi_User5 wrote:I prefer the current icon. It fits much better.
Agree, it's one of the best icons we have. I wouldn't change a pixel of that one.
Agreed. The desktop icons look sooo nice and sharp after I fixed the blurry icons. Besides, this is the first view of ReactOS after an new user installs it. Let's give the best UX experience ever.
I use ReactOS on real hardware. Will you? My Computers: https://www.reactos.org/wiki/PC_ROS_Rigs Go all the way to the bottom.

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justincase
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by justincase »

As someone who's used Linux occasionally for quite a while, the 'house' that's on the folder gives the idea of it being the user's 'home' folder (aka ~/) which it isn't, but the paper added to the outside in "New #1" looks wrong to me, and the papers added to the inside in "New #2" are sticking out too much and/or too wavy. If you want to mess with this icon, I'd suggest subtly sticking just the edges of two or three pages out along the top edge of the slightly opened front of the folder, but not out so far as to cover (even partially) the top edge of the back of the folder. However, even with the feeling that it resembles a 'home' folder, which it isn't, I don't think My Documents requires a new icon (yet?) while other parts of ReactOS really could use the attention of the 'UX Team'.
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Swyter
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by Swyter »

justincase wrote:As someone who's used Linux occasionally for quite a while, the 'house' that's on the folder gives the idea of it being the user's 'home' folder (aka ~/) which it isn't, but the paper added to the outside in "New #1" looks wrong to me, and the papers added to the inside in "New #2" are sticking out too much and/or too wavy. If you want to mess with this icon, I'd suggest subtly sticking just the edges of two or three pages out along the top edge of the slightly opened front of the folder, but not out so far as to cover (even partially) the top edge of the back of the folder. However, even with the feeling that it resembles a 'home' folder, which it isn't, I don't think My Documents requires a new icon (yet?) while other parts of ReactOS really could use the attention of the 'UX Team'.
Once the desktop.ini-parsing-(?)-for-shell32 patch gets committed (to have custom icons in special folders) Henry could make the different icons for My Documents sub-folders like My Music, My Pictures, and so on. Also, he could reuse the work from this effort. I think that the house icon is self-describing, and makes sense, since in pre-Vista My Documents is actually used as main container for everything, the general dump of user data was in there.

Microsoft decided that didn't make sense and now we have a base user folder with different sub-categories hanging from the same level. But ReactOS aims for NT5, so no Vista+ UX changes.
External patch contributor for ux/user-mode/l10n/winapi. Sometimes I fix a bit of everything everywhere.
justincase
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by justincase »

Swyter wrote:I think that the house icon is self-describing, and makes sense, since in pre-Vista My Documents is actually used as main container for everything, the general dump of user data was in there.
I have never kept more than a few files in "My Documents", and I know for a fact that many people keep a lot of their stuff (in folders) on the desktop, which is not in "My Documents", so for them at least, it isn't "the general dump of user data", plus it doesn't hold %APPDATA% either. I personally keep almost everything of mine on a separate hard drive, which is not linked in any way to "My Documents".
Swyter wrote:Microsoft decided that didn't make sense and now we have a base user folder with different sub-categories hanging from the same level. But ReactOS aims for NT5, so no Vista+ UX changes.
In Vista+, the C:\Users\username folder is really no different (except in directory structure of a few of the subfolders) from C:\Documents and Settings\username in "pre-Vista", both of which contain "[My ]Documents", the desktop, and the App[lication ]Data, Local Settings, etc. directories. So I would say those are more like a "general dump of user data" than anything inside of them, and also that they are more akin to a Linux/Unix/etc. 'home' (~/) directory than anything else on any version of Windows/ReactOS.

Anyway, there's no point in arguing with me about whether the "My Documents" icon gets changed, I don't really have any appreciable deciding power on it, and I've already stated that I would prefer the current version over either of the new ones, and that I see no reason to bother changing it right now. I was only stating that I still think there is a little bit of room for improvement, what kind of changes might (in my opinion) be an improvement, and that if someone wanted to post another version, I'm not particularly attached to or against the current one, and thus wouldn't be pre-decided for or against it.
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PurpleGurl
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by PurpleGurl »

I'm with Oldman on this. While new #2 is the best here, IMHO, none are really what I'd envision. I'd like something a little plainer. The house on the current one is silly. It isn't about the Internet home page at all. But I do understand the fear of looking too much like a certain existing commercial product. And without doubt, we know what some end users will do after we become more usable. They will copy over com32dlg.dll, shell32.dll or whatever, or use a resource hacker, and guess what they will make it look like?

And to be honest, I would rather we not duplicate the "My Documents," as I see that as a kludgy mess. I never use that. I put things in the folders I want them to be in. I hate having to track down the My Documents or My Downloads folder after I've save to there by mistake (since that is the default that is foisted onto you). I'd rather be prompted for location every time. But if it is needed for compatibility or for lesser astute users, then I understand having it there.
middings
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by middings »

I think My Documents must be retained for compatibility. I use the My Documents folder and its subfolders frequently. I use them for files that fit the metaphor of 'documents', e.g. word processing files, photos, clip art images, scanner output, spreadsheets, and .pdf files. For code development projects, I sometimes use other folders because the path from the drive's root directory to My Documents and its subfolder is lengthy. Alternative folders can also be more convenient when using Command Prompt.

I sympathize with PurpleGurl's frustration with My Documents being the default folder for many applications but I think that is the fault of the application's design. Something has to be the default folder. Making the folder or directory in which the application was launched the default folder creates different problems. A well-designed application's set up allows the person installing it to choose the application's default folder and, if the chosen folder does not exist, the set up automatically creates it.
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Swyter
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by Swyter »

This is a perfect example of bikeshedding. Let's concentrate on the loads of sub-par icons and small UX pitfalls, and once everything is decent we can think of little details for small cognitive metaphors.
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middings
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Re: Poll: My Documents Icon

Post by middings »

Swyter wrote:This is a perfect example of bikeshedding.
I disagree.
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