and Aplication interface
Using Professional Icons for a better communication between
User and Aplication interface.
Today\’s applications – either for the Web or standalone – are
starting to focus more and more on the user interface. The time
when you had to write lines and lines of commands or go through
several menus to execute a certain task has passed. Developers
have now implemented simple wizards, with on-screen help near
each important element of the application, which will make even
the most complicated task look like a walk in the park. And the
easiest and most efficient way to create user-friendly
interfaces is to add self-explanatory icons. These small images
that take a couple dozens of pixels will most of the times have
more meaning than a full paragraph of text. It\’s more
comfortable and efficient to insert an icon than it is to write
some text explaining a certain function.
Icons are very important to the user-interface. People want to
use an application\’s features to the maximum, and don\’t like to
it when they can\’t find how to complete a specific task. This is
why developers should always create shortcuts to the main tasks
that can be accomplished using their application. These shortcut
items must catch the user\’s attention, so adding icons will do
the trick in most of the cases. The icons must be related to
that certain task, so, for example, a disk icon would be a great
visual enhancement for a \”Save\” button, as a printer icon would
fit perfectly inside a \”Print\” button. A good set of icons in
the interface will greatly improve the communication between the
user and the application. Icons are colorful and, in most cases,
larger than the description text of the application feature they
relate to; this way, they are a lot easier to be spotted.
Most of today\’s applications use icons, even though pretty much
all developers don\’t bother to implement custom designed icons
into their applications. Actually, settling with the operating
system\’s default stock icons is not such a bad thing as some
people might think. Computer users might sometimes have some
problems adapting to new applications, especially if they have
different interfaces than the applications already installed on
the users\’ computers. What happens if you want to save and
you\’re looking for a disk icon, but you can\’t find it because
the developer decided to use a star icon? If so, there will be a
poor communication between the user and the application, because
the interface\’s icons are different from the ones the user is
used to. Application developers should not fall into this trap
just because they like some other icons and they don\’t want to
use the same old default system icons, because it would do more
bad than good. The default system icons are preferred because
most applications use them, so users will learn to use your
application a lot faster. The functions and commands will be
easier to understand, because users will be able to faster
identify the iconic symbols.
If a developer wants to give their application a distinct look,
they should use professional, custom-made icons, especially
designed for their application. Today, such services are
affordable, and you will be able to tell the designer how you
want the icons to look like. In most cases, you shouldn\’t go
with a completely different look than the system\’s icons (for
the reasons described above), but you should try to give them a
unique, personal touch; the application will stand out from the
crowd and will look a lot better than the other ones, thus
attracting more users. Changing colors, for example, is the
easiest way to get new, yet similar icons.
To have a good communication between the user and the
application, developers must predict all the possible problems
that the interface could cause its users. Are the buttons too
small? Are they too big? Can the toolbars be moved around the
screen? How about the menus, can users add new items to them?
Also, can they replace the icons and other graphics with some of
their own? How about users with special needs?
Unfortunately, there are a lot of developers that disregard such
problems, and create rigid interfaces, which cannot be changed
by the users to better suit them. A simple answer to this
problem is to create multiple skins, with different colors and
different icons. The application should have a \”standard\” skin
to start with, and then a few different skins, for example a
minimalistic skin with only a few main buttons and large icons,
or an \”expanded\” skin with many toolbars and buttons, each with
their own small icon. Also, a skin with high contrast colors and
icons will be very appreciated by the users with eye problems.
Apart from all these, developers should also allow users to
create their own custom skin and use different icons.
There are multiple benefits from using icons in an application
interface. No matter whether an application uses the operating
system\’s default icons or has custom-made icons designed
especially for it, there must be some form of graphics in it,
otherwise people might find it harder to use. This may happen
because most of today\’s application use icons to ease the
learning of the application. Because most applications use
similar icons in certain tasks – for example a printer icon for
printing or a disk button for saving files – it\’s a lot faster
for users to click on those buttons, therefore they will
remember it next time they use that application, or any other
application for that matter. Even if later on advanced users
will choose to use shortcut keys on the keyboard instead of
clicking with the mouse on buttons in the toolbars, it\’s really
important that for starters they will use the toolbar, so icons
will be very important in the communication with the application.
If you are looking for professional icons, please visit:
icons do the difference\"> www.iconshock.com -
Proffesional Icons
About the author:
Iconshock: The leader company dedicated to professional icons
development for use in software graphic interfaces and web
design. Our hyper-realistic icons are fully inspired on the new
Windows Vista and Mac OS X.