One thing I don't understand is the move to monochrome icons. I'm really bloody good at recognizing shape+color combinations; the old icons were ugly, but I was able to find the tool I wanted in an instant. After the redesign of the icon pack, I always find myself slowly iterating through every icon in the toolbox to try to find the particular abstract monochrome shape I want.
I think a redesign of the icons was necessary, because the old ones don't look amazing. But you can make tasteful icons which are also colorful and recognizable.
(And I know you can switch icon themes, but when we're talking about UX, we're largely talking about the out-of-the-box experience. 99.9% of users are going to stick with the default icon pack.)
> (And I know you can switch icon themes, but when we're talking about UX, we're largely talking about the out-of-the-box experience. 99.9% of users are going to stick with the default icon pack.)
I agree the monochrome icons have significant disadvantages. Visual Studio a few years ago made the same attempt at having monochrome icons and there was such pushback that they eventually moved to the current scheme of "monochrome with a splash of colour", which I think is way better.
That said, Photoshop also uses monochrome icons and it can help in some ways to avoid distracting from the image which you are working on. I am not sure what the best compromise would be.
Franky the new icons are just not too good either. It's possible to have monochrome icons that are memorable and easily recognized—but GIMP's icons aren't that.
i think it would help if they were mostly a vertical list as well. the way they are now you are having to scan left to right but also moving downward as well. even 2 side by side like photoshop does is better since you can mostly just scan downwards
