Talk:OLPC Human Interface Guidelines/The Sugar Interface/Icons

XO discussion

I guess this starts the remarks on Icons for the Sugar Interface - I am surprised there is no prior entry.

The so-called "XO" icon should be redesigned:

It is supposed to represent the user - in an abstract iconic way - but sadly, it also looks very much like a symbol widely associated with mortality, toxicity and military killing - the skull and crossbones, cf. Skull_and_crossbones, Jolly_Roger, and Totenkopf. (The nicest associations one can offer are a parochial reference to a certain Yale University society or what SCO might say about Linux whenever Steve Ballmer has a bad hair day. <G>)

The binding of the symbol to these horrific meanings is a reflection of a biological fact about the last parts of a human corpse to decay, and is not especially tied to a particular culture.

Surely the intention was to represent a (living) human being, in particular a child, without biased reference to a particular sex, race or dress-style. I'd argue there are better designs one might use.

One example is direct use of the oldest Chinese ideograph for child/baby, as shown in the graphic above. What appears to be something of a derivative was in fact used within the logo for the International Year of the Child in 1979.

Note that a large head/torso ratio not only reflects the biology of children, but also the way in which child-made art focuses on the head in early Lowenfeld developmental stages.

Alternately, one might use variants on the "smiley-face", but avoid the Microsoft_Bob curse" by making the face either simpler or more complex.

Yet another choice would be a head-profile silhouette, cropped to include only the front of the face to avoid issues about dress and hairstyle, something not much unlike this. But this design is disfavored because it scales down poorly.

Docdtv 07:44, 1 December 2006 (EST)

Huh. And here I thought they were naming it after Sanrio's Badtz-Maru! From Wikipedia:

In Japanese "badtz" (batsu) is a term for X, the cross signifying a wrong answer. "Maru" is a term for O, or a correct answer. So, Badtz Maru not only means "bad penguin;" it is also a pun that means "wrong-correct," and is frequently represented by "XO". Indeed, with his friends Pandaba and Hana Maru, Badtz runs the mischievous XO clan.

Wrong, then right. A very nice metaphor for learning, if you ask me. --IanOsgood 20:30, 17 January 2007 (EST)

I agree, the X is slightly disquieting, even using nicer colours. And also the "jumping child" is alone. Maybe a variation of the Ubuntu logo would be better suited? --

But the icon is not just a picture representing the project. It has a specific meaning within the user interface: A solo icon represents one person/laptop. On the activity screen, there is one icon to represent your laptop, while on the neighborhood screen, there is an icon for each laptop in your neighborhood. If you instead show a group of three people for the icon, you then draw three people per laptop, which is confusing. Alternatively, you could use a one-person icon on the activity and neighborhood screens and a three-person icon everywhere else, but that would be inconsistent and also confusing. Fundamentally, it's hard to express the concept of an individual without also expressing the concept of aloneness.

I agree that the association with skull-and-crossbones is unfortunate, but I think it is possible to distinguish between the two. Usually skull-and-crossbones has a small X and a large head, while the XO icon has a large X and small head. The XO icon more closely abstracts the chinese icon above than it does the skull-and-crossbones. Vertically elongating the X or adding a short body line would have helped, though.