Sunday, December 20, 2015

Icon Impersonation

Some software companies give their programs an icon in the style of more popular software suites. I have on my desktop at the moment a program that tries to look like part of the Office 2013 suite.

The problem? Such false icon associations might initially make the user feel good ("oh, I know how to use Word, I can do this too!"), but the user will soon be confused, disappointed, and upset when the program fails to adhere to all the UI patterns of the suite it's imitating. Also, experienced users will just think it's silly.

The moral? Develop your own look, and do your best to have an intuitive interface that won't leave the user disillusioned when it is discovered that you're not really part of what you're impersonating.

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