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From: ian@mva.cs.liv.ac.uk
Newsgroups: comp.edu,sci.edu,comp.cog-eng
Subject: Re: What to know & universal icons
Message-ID: <841@mva.cs.liv.ac.uk>
Date: 25 Aug 89 13:59:23 GMT
References: <56543@aerospace.AERO.ORG> <19238@mimsy.UUCP> <8351@boring.cwi.nl>
Organization: Computer Science CSMVAX, Liverpool University
Lines: 45

In article <8351@boring.cwi.nl>, lambert@piring.cwi.nl (Lambert Meertens) writes:
> In article <19238@mimsy.UUCP> don@brillig.umd.edu.UUCP (Don Hopkins) writes:
> 
> Icon 0
> 
> ) 	  *
> ) 	 **
> ) 	********
> ) 	 **
> ) 	  *
> 
> unmistakably depicts a goose flying towards the right -- no space aliens
> needed there.

I think that icons are context dependent. If you're looking at a signpost
or following a marked route and see icon 0, you will interpret it as a left
arrow. If (this may get somewhat bizarre!) you are a pilot flying through
an area inhabited by geese and you see this sign suspended from a helium
filled balloon, you may interpret icon 0 as `beware of high-flying geese'.
Similarly with the down arrow, it can be interpreted as meaning `behind
you' on a station direction board or `this lane for ...' on a (British)
motorway. If you were driving down the motorway and saw a sign (sorry for
the additional lines):

                             LIVERPOOL
                                ***
                                ***
                               *****
                                ***
                                 *

You wouldn't turn round and go in the opposite direction, but if you saw
the same icon on a sign just outside a town, you would realise that you
_do_ have to turn round.

I believe that you have to learn the meanings of icons and the context in
which they apply.

Ian Finch              Janet: ian@uk.ac.liv.cs.mva
---------              Internet: ian%mva.cs.liv.ac.uk@cunyvm.cuny.edu
                       UUCP: ...mcvax!ukc!ian@uk.ac.liv.cs.mva
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  Icon: A complex, blurry and easily misinterpreted pictorial representation
        of a single unambiguous word.
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