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Iconography of the PuTTY tools

chiark.greenend.org.uk

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Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#61

Post by Kwpolska »

Aeolun wrote: post #28
samstave wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my "hero memories" was a time when I was a master of Win95 - and a friend had accidentally changed ALL of her display options to black - so all the UI was black, but I knew Win95 so well I could navigate the entire OS via keyboard - and was able to from memory navigate through the start menu, to settings, knowing how many tabs to hit to get to display and change that back to default. The people watching though…

What I think is amazing is that W95 fit on a set of floppies. I think the only installation medium I’ve ever seen for it was a CD-ROM.

Windows 95 came on 13 floppies. That version excluded most fancy features, you can't compress ~360 MB to ~22.

Windows 11 could also "fit on a set of floppies" - although thousands of floppies would be completely absurd, it is not impossible.

Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#62

Post by usrusr »

arp242 wrote: post #36
t0mas88 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perfectly documented warning stickers for everything is such a British thing. Together with fused plugs and on/off switches for every socket. As a foreigner who lived in London for a few years I believe the UK leads the world in self-deprecation. No country complains about itself more while being so absurdly well-organized.

The "Elderly People" road signs win for me: https://c8.alamy.com/comp/2GYPJR6/an-elderly-people-roadside... The first time I saw one of these I stopped to take a picture. It just seems the most ridiculous thing to warn people about, as if somehow "elderly people" can't cross the road.

They can and they will and when you run them over because you where going at the speed limit minding your own WhatsApp nobody will come to your rescue blaming the victim for jaywalking.

You might consider them redundant because elderly people can also cross the road where there aren't any signs, but then few warning signs aren't.

Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#63

Post by globular-toast »

voussoir wrote: post #55
Sharlin wrote: post #11

> I can’t remember why the lightning bolt was yellow. With hindsight that seems the strangest thing about it; cyan would have been a more obvious choice for electricity. Possibly it was just to contrast more with the blue screens of the computers. I had to stop and consider this, because it seemed to me that yellow was "obviously" the correct color. And indeed a few image searches confirmed this: a yellow lightning b…

It's funny, I was just thinking about this recently. I noticed that a lot of electric cars or PHEVs use cyan accents to signal that they are EVs, yet I also think yellow is the more obvious color for electricity.

Actually I think yellow is only appropriate if it's a lightning bolt. Otherwise it wouldn't make me think of electricity. Cyan hints is more "cyber" like Tron or something.

Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#64

Post by reddalo »

RadiozRadioz wrote: post #16

> I think that’s probably because the 1990s styling is part of what makes PuTTY what it is – “reassuringly old-fashioned” This is definitely something that attracts me to PuTTY. There _is_ something reassuring about applications that look the way PuTTY does - maybe the aged look projects stability due to lack of change, maybe it's just the additional cohesion from using OS primitives, I'm not sure. What I am sure of…

>the additional cohesion from using OS primitives

I miss using win32 software. It was the best: simple, quick to render, clean and information-dense. Now everything uses large "modern Windows" widgets or, even worse, Electron.

Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#65

Post by petesergeant »

t0mas88 wrote: post #24
gerdesj wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Simon Tathum is British and I have never knowingly seen a lightning bolt coloured cyan hereabouts. Our "Danger of death" signs are black on yellow (1) To be fair an image search for lightning does look decidedly cyan on royal, with purple, red and more options. (1) https://www.hse.gov.uk/electricity/nearelectric.htm#signs

Perfectly documented warning stickers for everything is such a British thing. Together with fused plugs and on/off switches for every socket. As a foreigner who lived in London for a few years I believe the UK leads the world in self-deprecation. No country complains about itself more while being so absurdly well-organized.

> No country complains about itself more while being so absurdly well-organized.

I’ve noticed Australians seem to have a similar issue: they decry the Nanny State at home, but all the ones I’ve met abroad complain about the current location being insufficiently nannified. Often both complaints in the same conversation.

Finally: Italians. I thought a trip from Milan to Rome was going to be like a trip through Somalia the way the Italians I know describe their country. In fact, everything seemed to work exceptionally smoothly, although whenever I bring this up I’m told that I simply didn’t venture south enough.

Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#67

Post by robinhouston »

petesergeant wrote: post #65
t0mas88 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perfectly documented warning stickers for everything is such a British thing. Together with fused plugs and on/off switches for every socket. As a foreigner who lived in London for a few years I believe the UK leads the world in self-deprecation. No country complains about itself more while being so absurdly well-organized.

> No country complains about itself more while being so absurdly well-organized. I’ve noticed Australians seem to have a similar issue: they decry the Nanny State at home, but all the ones I’ve met abroad complain about the current location being insufficiently nannified. Often both complaints in the same conversation. Finally: Italians. I thought a trip from Milan to Rome was going to be like a trip through Somalia…

That’s not my experience of Australians at all! The Australians I’ve met (through working for an Australian company) all seem to love their nanny state, and genuinely don’t understand how anyone could see anything undesirable in it.

Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#68

Post by 0xEF »

Sharlin wrote: post #11

> I can’t remember why the lightning bolt was yellow. With hindsight that seems the strangest thing about it; cyan would have been a more obvious choice for electricity. Possibly it was just to contrast more with the blue screens of the computers. I had to stop and consider this, because it seemed to me that yellow was "obviously" the correct color. And indeed a few image searches confirmed this: a yellow lightning b…

This is pure speculation on my part, but I wonder if the yellow lightning bolt stayed yellow in the PuTTY icon (among other uses) because the symbol was likely just borrowed from safety warnings. Yellow has been preferred for a long time since it's considered a high-vis color and would typically stand out on industrial machinery housing where you might want to clearly warn someone of shock hazard with a pictograph so the warning transcends language. The lightning bolt stayed yellow as a result of "that's how we've always done it, I guess" thinking

Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#69

Post by delta_p_delta_x »

arp242 wrote: post #36
t0mas88 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perfectly documented warning stickers for everything is such a British thing. Together with fused plugs and on/off switches for every socket. As a foreigner who lived in London for a few years I believe the UK leads the world in self-deprecation. No country complains about itself more while being so absurdly well-organized.

The "Elderly People" road signs win for me: https://c8.alamy.com/comp/2GYPJR6/an-elderly-people-roadside... The first time I saw one of these I stopped to take a picture. It just seems the most ridiculous thing to warn people about, as if somehow "elderly people" can't cross the road.

> It just seems the most ridiculous thing to warn people about, as if somehow "elderly people" can't cross the road

I don't understand this mindset. Do people not walk where you live, or do you not have elderly care homes? I've been to _multiple_ countries and nearly all of them with some uniform signage standard warn motorists about elderly and children crossing.

Re: Iconography of the PuTTY tools

#70

Post by petesergeant »

robinhouston wrote: post #67
petesergeant wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No country complains about itself more while being so absurdly well-organized. I’ve noticed Australians seem to have a similar issue: they decry the Nanny State at home, but all the ones I’ve met abroad complain about the current location being insufficiently nannified. Often both complaints in the same conversation. Finally: Italians. I thought a trip from Milan to Rome was going to be like a trip through Somalia…

That’s not my experience of Australians at all! The Australians I’ve met (through working for an Australian company) all seem to love their nanny state, and genuinely don’t understand how anyone could see anything undesirable in it.

Somehow the same country that venerates Ned Kelly
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