[Pythonmac-SIG] Fwd: MacPython icon mockup

[has]

Bill Janssen wrote:

> > I appreciate what you want to do, but IMHO the correct way to have
> > gone about this would have been to design the new Python logo from
> > the start to be appropriate as an OS X icon.
>
>Again, logos and icons are two different things.  Incorporating the
>logo as an element of the "OS X"ish icon would be the way to go.

Indeed. The Python logo is just a badge to be applied to the larger graphic(s) as necessary, in this case a family of four(?) OS X icons representing an interactive Python editor (IDLE), .py document file, .pyc/.pyo document file, and drag-n-drop script runner. The visual language for representing text-based editors and document files on OS X is extremely well established (e.g. compare Script Editor.app and .scpt documents), and there's probably a fair bit of precedence for the script runner too. So there's no reason that all of this shouldn't be regarded as a wholly solved problem.

Now, some folk are bound to moan that the resulting icons look 'boring' or 'unoriginal', but quite honestly this matters not one whit. (Similarly, to those who don't personally like the new Python icon: tough, but it's a done deal now so suck it up and move on.) The only thing that matters is that these new icons are finished to a high standard (replete with drop shadows and subtle shading and highlights to give it some life, no crappy blocky aliasing, well-done alpha masks, and available in several sizes) and are instantly identifiable to users when displayed on screen. Remember, Python is a tool - a means to an end - not an end in itself. As long as they look professionally done, the desktop icons aren't what sells it (or not) to users. Folk are so busy over-analysing the problem to create the Gr8st Ic0nZ Evah!!!!1!! that we'll still be having this same argument come Python 2.6, and meantime 2.5 will be shipping with those dated, painfully amateurish and badly re-rendered OS 8 icons.

All it needs is somebody with some decent Photoshop compositing skills (and maybe a nice 3D drawing of a technical pencil) to assemble the finished elements. I'd have done it myself by now just to settle it, only I don't have access to a decent copy of Photoshop any more and am a bit rusty after a few years out of the game, but I'm fair tempted to grit teeth and beat it out in the GIMP anyway. I'd be happy that someone with more practice at icon work did it though; that Kenichi Yoshida chap, for example, looks like he could do a very nice job just given the raw resources and left to get on with it.

has
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