[ubuntu-art] trash icon looks like a battery

[Frank Schoep]

Hi Sven,

On Tuesday 25 April 2006 21:13, Sven Jaborek wrote:
> ...
> The trash-can as it works now is useless anyway. It has got two jobs:
> 1) u can use it to drop files on it
> 2) u should be able to see if trash is getting big
>
> It doesnt fit for 1 because its to tricky to drop on a icon that small,
> who is really doing this. I have no study about this, but i use del-key
> or the context menu.
> ...

From a usability point of view, the icon is not small - in fact its dimensions 
are infinite: because it is placed in a corner of the screen, you can throw 
your mouse pointer all the way to the bottom right and you'd always hit the 
icon. In fact, this is the way I use the wastebasket mostly since I often 
have my right hand on the mouse which makes the keyboard "Del" button a 
second choice.

> ...
> It doesnt do its second job better, it only knows full and empty. If you
> drop a zero-size file into it - the icon tells you its full. Not really
> logical. People always think they have to clean up.
> If you handover the icon, what more information do you get? "There are
> 23 files in your trash." U nice - is this good or bad?
> ...

Although it isn't the best solution available, Ubuntu (rather GNOME) isn't 
lagging behind in this area, since most other desktop OSes tend to only have 
two states as well. The number of files is just a unit of measurement for 
your information.

But to come back on the original problem, the shape of the icon, I must agree 
that it does tend to look like a battery, it had me confused for a minute at 
first, thinking my desktop just got a UPS or something. The old wastebasket 
icon wasn't nearly as slick as the new one, but did a better job at conveying 
the trashcan metaphor. But in the end I'm not in a high-up judgement position 
so I'll leave that discussion to the others.

With kind regards,

Frank Schoep