New Icon for Std_Part

[bitacovir]

Std_Part icon is too similar to Body icon and this is cause of confusion for beginners, as is mentioned in this post: https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic. ... 88#p436293

This thread is for a new Std Part icon https://wiki.freecadweb.org/Std_Part
My proposal is shown bellow. Your feedback is welcome.

Std_Part.svg

(17.87 KiB) Downloaded 112 times

BxkHw4VDgu.png (25.88 KiB) Viewed 3623 times

[vocx]

...
My proposal is shown bellow. Your feedback is welcome.

Ah! I'm not a big fan of rounded shapes for this operation. I want it to be blocky, like legos that "connect" to each other. Remember that Std_Part is the basis for the assembly workbenches (with the help of App Link), so it should give this idea of assembly.

What about some icon that includes gears, would that be possible?

[bitacovir]

What about some icon that includes gears, would that be possible?

Do you mean something like this?:

http://www.myiconfinder.com/icon/gears- ... tool/17854

[vocx]

...
Do you mean something like this?:

Yeah, something like that. Maybe inside some box to give the idea of "pieces inside a container".

The idea of the gears comes from Catia, by the way. See here, CATIA V5: Copying and Pasting Tips.

What they call "Product" would be more or less our concept of assembly, or top-most container. I'm not saying we should exactly clone their icons, but maybe something similar works in FreeCAD.

[chrisb]

I always think of the Part conatiner as a box where I can put objects into - even other boxes - and move them around. If I don't move them around it still indicates that they belong together.
Following that idea I can very well imagine a frame around the objects instead of the arrows.

[saso]

The icon is good, don't change it, what we should do is add the functionality for the Part container to automatically change its icon when it has sub Part containers in it, because in this case it behaves as a assembly. This is from the fact that we are using a single container for both Part and Assembly.

So when we add a Part container inside a Part container today we have the left tree, the proposed change is to have the right tree (in the links to older discussions below you can also find a blue version of the proposed Assembly icon). Note that the different icons on the right don't mean an implementation of an additional container, the current Part container would only have the additional functionality that it would change its icon when it detects that it has additional Part containers inside of it. Fusion and NX are using a single container for both Part and Assembly and both of them have this functionality. It is just a visual clue for the user to better understand the structure.

PartAsm.png (48.08 KiB) Viewed 3413 times

For comparison the icons NX is using to show the Part-Asm difference of the container (note, it is using a single "Part" container for both, it just shows the different icon in the tree).

NXPartAsm.png (4.51 KiB) Viewed 3382 times

Image from this blog post http://cadanand.blogspot.com/2017/10/si ... embly.html

And the icons Fusion is using to show the Part-Asm difference of the container (note, Fusion is calling Parts as Components, but it is actually the same thing, and it is also using a single "Part/Component" container for both, it just shows the different icon in the tree).

FusionPartAsm.png (17.53 KiB) Viewed 3380 times

Image from this blog post https://www.autodesk.com/products/fusio ... usion-360/

Here is an old discussion about this icons https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic. ... 5&start=60

Here are a few more examples from an older discussion about this https://forum.freecadweb.org/viewtopic. ... 26#p253226

[openBrain]

With all respect to proposal, I don't like it and find it still more confusing. Box & sphere makes me think to something related to 3D primitives. And the arrow makes me think to... I don't know... Sliding something?
IMO something inspired from docker container could be pretty representative and quite unique among other features.
Another good representation for me would be a galaxy or stellar system. It will both figure that a Part container seen from "far" has a virtual shape actually formed by its inner objects shape, and that when seen from inside it has its own coordinate system.

[vocx]

The icon is good, don't change it, what we should do is add the functionality for the Part container to automatically change its icon ...

The purpose of changing the icon is so it doesn't cause confusion with the PartDesign Body icon.

I know you are not happy with the current implementation with the Body concept, but that is beside the point. This topic is just about avoiding confusion in a simple way.

Also, about automatically changing the icon. This could be done, but is more complex. At the moment, using a different icon is a simpler solution.

By the way, the icon that you show in the right image, with the blue cube, that one is used by the Assembly4 workbench's "model", so I would not use it; that'd just create more confusion.

[vocx]

ping

You were involved in the last discussion about the Part icon, Icons for Part and Group. So it would be good to hear your opinions as a designer.

In my opinion, the current PartDesign Body and Std Part icons cause confusion, so one of them should be made sufficiently unique. See this thread.