A brilliant takedown of the menu icons in the latest version of MacOS, a version I’m still steadfastly refusing to upgrade to, from Niki Prokopov.
Apple decided to do a thing that was both impossible and undesirable, then did it badly:
“In my opinion, Apple took on an impossible task: to add an icon to every menu item. There are just not enough good metaphors to do something like that.
“But even if there were, the premise itself is questionable: if everything has an icon, it doesn’t mean users will find what they are looking for faster.
“And even if the premise was solid, I still wish I could say: they did the best they could, given the goal. But that’s not true either: they did a poor job consistently applying the metaphors and designing the icons themselves.”
In referencing the Human Interface Guidelines from 1992, Niki makes a point that many people would do well to remember:
“…is an interface manual from 1992 still relevant today? Haven’t computers changed so much that entirely new principles, designs, and idioms apply?
“Yes and no. Of course, advice on how to adapt your icons to black-and-white displays is obsolete. But the principles – as long as they are good principles – still apply, because they are based on how humans work, not how computers work.
“Humans don’t get a new release every year. Our memory doesn’t double. Our eyesight doesn’t become sharper. Attention works the same way it always has. Visual recognition, motor skills – all of this is exactly as it was in 1992.”