A new screenshot showing OS4’s default icon set by Martin “Mason” Merz has been revealed (not all icons shown in the shot are the new ones though). Also Q&A session 27 with Amiga’s CTO Fleecy Moss is now available. Hyperion, Eyetech, AmigaWorld.net and many more exhibitors will attend the upcoming AmiGBG fair in Sweden.
… orthogonal filing cabinet. That to me is a strange choice for a graphic designer.
Well, we wouldn’t want to introduce something new would we?
I never liked the amiga icons much, and these aren’t really an improvement.
These icons have too much of a retro amiga feel to them. Seriously, they should have tossed a few bucks to one of the KDE/Gnome icons set authors to convert them to amiga
Look in the “disks” section.
the floppy is labeled “Bad Disk”.
just found that amusing.
These icons are getting a lot of criticism on amigaworld.net, which is not exactly a refuge for anti-Amiga sentiment. A lot of Amiga users are unhappy with them. Amiga icons have always been easily replaceable, but judging from the reaction, these are likely to be forgotten faster than Pink.
The overuse of gradients is rather amateurish looking in my opinion. Looks like some cheesy shareware game from the early 90’s.
I like being able to tell what files types with a glance. When looking for a certain file we use the icons to quickly eliminate other files of other filetypes to limit our visual search of the folder/desktop. I think a bunch of those filing cabinet icons are too simular for easy differentiation.
It’s not just the icons, the whole window scheme needs a redo, it looks incredibly “flat”, and just plain ugly… Surely there are enough KDE/Gnome/XP Themes out there that they could have gotten a better feel for a good UI should be like.
I’m a huge amiga fan but when I looked at the screenshot my first reaction was “yuck!”. I would be the first person to scream at people for taking icons so seriously, but this one is really bad, sorry:(
They should have hired Everaldo, Foood, TigerT, or any of the other SuSE guys.
They’re very nice. They should stick to these.
Btw Everaldo’s icons sucks. He needs to change style.
I wonder if they are open to having volunteers help them out with these. It looks like they could use some help.
What is this? Back to the old 16-bit days? Retro is not in for OSes. It’s too bad, I guess alot of Amiga users don’t like it from what I hear. I’ve been using Fedora for a few weeks now and the icons are so much nicer. Perhaps they can call in on the linux community to help them create nicer icons.
Can Anyone post another link for the screenshot because It doesn’t show because my school has web blocking software blocking this site
The ‘calculator,’ ‘Ram Disk,’ and ‘MEmacs’ icons are _alright_, but that’s the end of my positive commments for this icon set….
Good lord, I used to be an Amiga zealot all the way up to 1996.. but these icons make it look like things haven’t changed at all. Check out some real icons:
http://www.xicons.com
http://www.iconfactory.com
“but these icons make it look like things haven’t changed at all.”
Tell me about it. I think the KDE 1.1.1 icons have these beat.
I have nothing but the best wishes for the AmigaOS4’s success, but i have to say THOSE ICONS MAKY MY EYES HURT. They are hideous. They are absolutely terrible, even the old GlowIcons set was ten times better.
Maybe Amiga Inc. should hire some graphic designers from Genesi
MorphOS looks faboulous and currently makes AmigaOS4 look ugleeeeeh.
oh, yes – maybe 10 years ago they would have been wonderful. i think you must really be a hardcore-amiga-user, to use such an ugly gui. i hope the underling os is technically much more disposed to the future, than it’s ui.
They are a bit… dated, and the drawer icons just plain ugly. Still, someone will have a better set out in no time…
Steve S. – the Bad Disk icon is used when a disk isn’t readable… unlike windows, workbench doesn’t show any icon when the floppy drive is empty, and so, even with an unformatted disk in has to have the option of showing something. Still, I know what you mean 😉
I like them 🙂
I’ve got an icon set for windows that looks simalar but bettter.
I have to say that the author’s previous icons were better. check them at http://www.masonicons.de
Give him some time, every amigan that has seen the icons have adviced him to do some modifications.
Awesome work Mason. These icons are a definite improvement from the old ones.
I can´t find anywhere that this is going to be the “Default AmigaOS4 Icon Set”. It´s the pre-release Icon set, and they will do for a pre-release.
> New OS4 pre-release Icon set
The title was changed after Martin’s comments at AmigaWorld.
The filing cabinets need to be in a neutral color to allow for variety without clash.
I too like the icon set. Plus, I also like the window skins. It’s very appropriate of Amiga. I think there are others who like these too but the ones who don’t are more vocal.
“… orthogonal filing cabinet. That to me is a strange choice for a graphic designer.”
We used to have images of individual drawers for drawers. As a drawer contains tools (the metaphor is the workshop, not the office), the kind of drawer found in a woodwork bench or plan chest might be more suitable than an office filing cabinet.
After all, an Amiga is not an office computer – never has been.
I like these icons. I think the colours are attractive and the general design is pleasant and friendly.
“Maybe Amiga Inc. should hire some graphic designers from Genesi
MorphOS looks faboulous and currently makes AmigaOS4 look ugleeeeeh.”
I haven’t seen MorphOS in action, but on the screen grabs I’ve seen I found the icons unpleasant and much too big. I know Fitt’s Law suggests they should be as big as possible, but what happens when there are dozens of files in a drawer?
Presumably there are lots of alternative icon sets for MorphOS and I may not have seen the best.
> I haven’t seen MorphOS in action, but on the screen grabs
> I’ve seen I found the icons unpleasant and much too big. I
> know Fitt’s Law suggests they should be as big as possible,
> but what happens when there are dozens of files in a drawer?
Excuse me but I for my own think that Icons are one of the most important keyfactors for people do internally decide whether they like a product or not. When you look at the MorphOS Icons you may get the impression for them being to BIG but that’s because most screenshots are done in 800×600 pixels or in 1024×768 and the majority of people surely use a much higher resolution where the apsect ratio of the Icons look normal again. By any means MorphOS has a bunch of different Icon sets that you can use. The easy use of PNG Icons make it simple to have the entire set replaced in no time. Regardless of the size I do believe that the MorphOS Icons look much more pleasing than the new 256 pre-OS4 Icons.
This has nothing to do with my pants are whiter than your pants discussion since I’m a quite neutral person regarding AmigaOS4/MorphOS/AROS (even if I do own a Pegasos) but I think to increase the sales of OS4 the Friedens seriously should consider using either the old GlowIcons or try implementing PNG support so they can enjoy other Icon sets as well.
As you can read here the majority of people mentioned that they don’t like these Icons and no offense I do share their opinion. To compete with nowadays requirements and the stuff offered in the Open Source competition really requires something more. The OS4 has a very nice Color and Window decoration theming which looks quite pleasing and professional. Something it has not to hide from – from the competition but the Icons somehow look total amateurish and don’t win a pot of flowers.
http://www.kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=10756-1….
http://www.kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=9781-1.j…
http://www.kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=6927-1.p…
http://www.kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=7264-1.p…
http://www.kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=9148-1.j…
http://www.kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=7214-1.j…
http://www.kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=3883-1.p…
http://www.kde-look.org/content/preview.php?preview=1&file=5483-1.p…
Please understand that I like to try helping here to get a better overall impression of AmigaOS4 – that is I try to help you here. In a modern computing you need to offer eyecandy as good as possible to attract new people. If you think YOU are happy with them then this doesn’t mean that the majoriy is too it only shows that you are stuck in the 90’s and never have looked over the border of the plate and on other Systems what they offer (a major mistake made by people) who still rest on the old flowers of eliteism and belief that they are still superior of others while the competition (even in the Open Source world) is not sleeping either. You need to offer something more pleasing than this to your customers.
Here some Screenshots of my MorphOS/GNOME Desktop:
http://www.akcaagac.com/index_desktop.html
http://www.morphzone.org/modules/myalbum/photos/223.png
http://www.morphzone.org/modules/myalbum/photos/224.jpg
greetings,
oGALAXYo
I thought we were in 2004 and not back in the 80s.
It’s a shame that they don’t have a professional graphics
designer in their team.
” I haven’t seen MorphOS in action, but on the screen grabs I’ve seen I found the icons unpleasant and much too big. I know Fitt’s Law suggests they should be as big as possible, but what happens when there are dozens of files in a drawer?”
MorphOS preferences has an option with which you can limit Maximum/Minimum icon sizes throughout your system. Larger/Smaller icons than the set limit will be scaled realtime. I suggest give it a go and check out MorphOS: you will find countless pleasant surprises, which are not so aggressively advertised like every tiny aspect of OS4.
@Dan Cox
Ambient is able to scale the icon to the size you want.
For example you can specify the maximun and minimal icon size. If an icon is too small compared to Ambient’S preferences, itwill make it bigger, and if it’s too bit, smaller.
MorphOS rules da world 🙂
Well done done mason. It’s nice to see that the metaphor of the “Workbench” is still adhered to. I’ve been using the Amiga since the 1.1 days, and have used Unix,Linux(KDE and,Gnome),Beos,OS2 on a limited basis,and OSX…oops almost forgot to mantion different versions of Windows. Eye candy is certainly something to keep in mind when marketing a desktop Os, but we should not forget that the primary thing that an icon does is represents an object that exist or action that one would like to take, It should communicate in as efficient a manner as possible what it is “representing”. It’s hieroglyphics. If it doesn’t do that first and formost it hasn’t done it’s job. It has been said before that the Amiga metaphor is a workbench and not an office. Glad to see that there is continuity and not more follow let’s the market leader. Scaleable icons for different resolutions and different aspect ratios is something that is needed though.
Wow these icons do really suck, in my opinion… Compare them to let’s say Crystal or Noia, and they look rather old….
But that’s just me
“I thought we were in 2004 and not back in the 80s.”
Those designs don’t look at all like 1980s icons. But the important thing is that an icon should be functional – its identity should be clear at a glance. Many (or most) of the icon sets I see this year seem to be images for the sake of images. They are pictures (and not very attractive ones), not icons.
The MorphOS ones are an example. Too much photographic detail, and IMO rather gloomy colouring.
“It’s a shame that they don’t have a professional graphics
designer in their team.”
There is no guarantee that a person with a piece of paper saying he or she has taken a course in graphic design will be able to produce a good set of icons. Some of them learn nothing except how to use a couple of computer programs (Quark, Photoshop and Dreamweaver).
“But the important thing is that an icon should be functional – its identity should be clear at a glance. Many (or most) of the icon sets I see this year seem to be images for the sake of images. They are pictures (and not very attractive ones), not icons.”
Don is right in what he says about funtionality and how they should be clear at a glance. To my mind the best icons that I thought acomplished this was in NeXT OS. Which by the way, Commodore used as their guidline for 2.O or is it 3.0? They literaly looked in the Next manual while they were designing it.
On Amiga, whenever the system detects a disk it can’t cope with it will show a special icon labeled “Bad Disk”. This way you can context-menu the disk-info or format it. Traditionlly it has been a floppy-icon, since in the early days there only was floppies. That’s the reason.
As for the icons. Yes, they are not perfect. They are AmigaOS3.9 style. The advantage is, over any other OS icon themes, that these are these are complete !
The same style exists as icons for applications with more than 1000 action’s for toolbars.
Whenever I see a Windows or Linx theme they work this way:
On the one side, application’s buttons are so limited, that you do not need many any way. KDE has some default, the rest is simply not available as functionality.
The styles are not consistant, since not all icons are covered by the themes.
On the Amiga this is different. Since the apps are available for so many years, the icons have gone through several revisions, users contributed to styles.
I prefer the Amiga way, though the icons might not be as nice, over the other OS’ a billion times.
Amiga is still the best OS in the world, missing “exe-candy” and “workstation-look” can’t change that.
Most Amiga users on amigawolrd.net comment positive.
Just read it. It’s for them and not for you. 😉 They *know* the features behind these icons-sets (as outlined in my previous post)
Most Amiga users on amigawolrd.net comment positive.
Just read it.
Okay, here’s my tally at 2.01 EST on Feb 17th: 22 positive, 19 negative, 14 mixed, and LOTS of discussion about outlines, drop shadows and “prefs question marks” that I didn’t count one way or the other.
That doesn’t seem like mostly positive.
It’s for them and not for you.
To the contrary, there’s been a lot of talk that they want to make a “good first impression” to the world at large, and they certainly want to attract people who aren’t currently Amiga users (which is why Mike Bouma posted it here anyway).
“It’s for them and not for you.
To the contrary, there’s been a lot of talk that they want to make a “good first impression” to the world at large, and they certainly want to attract people who aren’t currently Amiga users (which is why Mike Bouma posted it here anyway).”
Mike posted it because he can’t shut up. I would have kept this within Amiga circles until at least version 4.0 came out. Preferably 4.2 – remember how much OS X improved.
It is much too soon for a first impression.
OTOH this site particular is for discussing raw and experimental and incomplete OSes, which is what AmigaOS is at present. So people may be interested to read of the developmental process. But they should not confuse an unfinished project with a finished commercial product.
Only very determined Amiga lovers are going to pay for an expensive motherboard running a beta OS.
I was a bit surprised that so many people on Amigaworld didn’t like these icons, which are very much in the Amiga tradition. There seems to be a feeling around that the way Windows and Linux do things must be right. I disagree.
I was a bit surprised that so many people on Amigaworld didn’t like these icons, which are very much in the Amiga tradition. There seems to be a feeling around that the way Windows and Linux do things must be right. I disagree.
I didn’t care for the icons, but for very a specific reason: Mason chose to overuse gradients to achieve contrast, so they’re physically painful to look at. That seems to be the majority opinion among the dissenters. They remind me of how the original NewIcons programmer described Magic Workbench icons: to use a polite term, he called it “artistic [self-gratification]”.
As for Mason’s older, simpler Glow Icons style, I loved it. I agree that these are in the Amiga tradition, but I don’t like his new style at all.
I would have kept this within Amiga circles until at least version 4.0 came out.
I personally agree; I don’t think that all Amiga development news needs to be posted to OSNews.
…functional – but what about functional AND nice looking? i don’t think, functional icons can’t look nice at all. just have a look at other modern desktops like kde or os x.
News is news. There are enough people who still are interested in hearing the latest developments about AmigaOS4 as can be testified with over 14 thousand screenshot pageviews already. I don’t believe this should be censored for just a select few who follow these developments on a daily basis.
Of course you will see many “just let it die” or “it sucks” comments, don’t let that bother you, this always happen when people feel emotionally attached any subject on the internet. This happens with Microsoft, Apple, Linux products and anything that is still considered important enough to be any kind of danger to the position of other products.
“http://www.iconfactory.com“
Yuk.
Those icons even make Windows XP’s default look good.
Please people, remember that not everyone likes their desktop/workbench to be a riot of colour. Icons can be *too* fancy. I like the AOS4 icon set: it’s clearly Amiga, but not too fussy.
Anyone wants fussy, they can muck it up themselves.