Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly 6. Add a pattern to prevent coarse dithering. This technique minimizes banding and dithering on displays with 256 or fewer colors (see Maximizing Color Quality). The first graphic is an exploded view of an icon that shows how the pattern is added. The next graphic shows an icon in which a pattern has been added to the color detail. 7. Define the empty area around the icon graphic (in which you have not drawn anything) as transparent pixels in the GIF file. This practice ensures that the background color shows through; if the icon is dragged to or displayed on a different background, the area surrounding it matches the color or pattern of the rest of the background. 8. Test your icon on target platforms. Designing Button Graphics Button graphics appear inside buttons–most often in toolbar buttons. Such graphics identify the action, setting, mode, or other function represented by the button. For instance, clicking the button might carry out an action (creating a new file) or set a state (boldfaced text). For a collection of button graphics designed in the Java look and feel, see Appendix B. The graphics in this repository can also be found on the book’s companion CD-ROM.

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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly recognizable as the same object. 2. Add some basic color (green is used here). 3. Draw a highlight on the inside top and left using white or a lighter shade of the existing color. This practice creates the flush 3D style of the Java look and feel. 4. Add some detail to the icon. In this case, the crease or “fold” mark in the hanging folder is drawn. 5. Try a gradient that produces a “shining” effect instead of the flat green. Here a dark green has replaced the black border on the right and bottom; black is not a requirement as long as there is a well-defined border.

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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly Don’t mix two- and three-dimensional styles in the same icon family. Use the flush 3D style so that your icons suit the Java look and feel. For more on the flush 3D style, see Producing the Flush 3D Effect. Because icons must appear on various backgrounds across platforms, the borders of graphics must maintain consistent color. Changing the appearance of an object’s border to look smoother at screen resolution in relationship to a specific color is called anti-aliasing. In most application development cases, anti-aliasing is not desirable because you are unlikely to be sure what background color the object will appear against. However, within an icon, anti-aliasing can provide smoother interior lines. For satisfactory display on a wide range of background colors and textures, use a clear, dark exterior border and ensure that there is no anti-aliasing or other detail around the perimeter of the graphic. Drawing Icons The following section uses a simple folder as an example of how to draw an icon. Before you start, decide on a general design for the object. In this example, a hanging file folder is used to represent a directory. 1. Draw a basic outline shape first. Icons can use as much of the available space as possible because they are displayed without borders. Icons should usually be centered horizontally in the available space. For vertical spacing, consider aligning to the lower edge of other icons in the set, or aligning with the baseline of text, as shown in the figure. If multiple sizes of an icon are required, work on them at the same time rather than trying to scale down a large icon later; all sizes then can evolve into designs that are
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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly Design icons to identify clearly the objects or concepts they represent. Keep the drawing style symbolic, as opposed to photo-realistic. Too much detail can make it more difficult for users to recognize what the icon represents. When designing large and small icons that represent the same object, make sure that they have similar shape, color, and detail. Specify tool tips for each icon so that assistive technologies can use the accessibleDescription property to find out how to use the icon. Specify the accessibleName property for each icon so that assistive technologies can find out what the icon is. Consider providing an option that enables users to switch from smaller to larger icons. Since sizes of icons vary across platforms, determine the size requirements of your target platform and provide suitably sized icons. Working With Icon Styles Icons can appear as flat drawings or as perspective drawings. The flush 3D style is a unique effect that can be applied to either flat (2D) or perspective (3D) icons. The following figure shows flush 3D icons for files and folders drawn in the perspective and flat styles. Icons drawn in the flush 3D style fit best with the Java look and feel. For information on how to create the flush 3D style, see Drawing Icons and Producing the Flush 3D Effect. Three visual elements appear in the sample icons: an interior highlight (to preserve the flush style used throughout the Java look and feel), a pattern to minimize dithering (described in Working With Available Colors), and a dark border. Figure 44 Two Families of Flush 3D Icons Use a single style to create a “family” of icons that utilize common visual elements to reflect similar concepts, roles, and identity. Icons in families might use a similar palette, size, and style.
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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly Icons Button graphics Symbols Use the GIF file format for application graphics. It usually results in a smaller file size than the JPEG format and uses lossless compression. To facilitate localization, place all application graphics in resource bundles. Where possible, use globally understood icons, button graphics, and symbols. Where none exist, create them with input from international sources. If you can’t create a single symbol that works in all cultures, define appropriate graphics for different locales (but try to minimize this task). Designing Icons Icons typically represent containers, documents, network objects, or other data that users can open or manipulate within an application. An icon usually appears with identifying text. Sizes for icons vary from platform to platform. Two common sizes are 16 x 16 pixels and 32 x 32 pixels. In the Java look and feel, the smaller size is used in the title bar of windows (to identify the contents of the window or minimized window) and inside tree components (for container and leaf nodes). You can use 32 x 32 icons for the desktop representation of Microsoft Windows applications and for components in applications designed for users with visual impairments, or for objects in a diagram, such as a network topology.
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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly Plain Dithering added Gradient added Dithering added to gradient The plain graphic in the preceding table, which uses a large area of a single web-safe color, dithers badly on Microsoft Windows and CDE. A gradient effect is added to the original graphic to add some visual interest; this produces a banding effect on Mac OS. Adding the dithered pattern along with the gradient produces good results on all three platforms with 8-bit color. In 16-bit and 24-bit color, the graphic reproduction is very close to, or exactly the same as, the originals. Categorizing Application Graphics Application graphics that you design fall into three broad categories: Icons, which represent objects that users can select, open, or drag Button graphics, which identify actions, settings, and tools (modes of the application) Symbols, which are used for general identification and labeling (for instance, as indicators of conditions or states) Table 5 Examples of Application Graphics Graphic Type Examples Flush 3D Style Pre-Dithered (With Added Gradients)
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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly To build the graphic: 1. Use a graphics application with layers. 2. Make a 1 x 1 pixel checkerboard pattern with the default secondary 3 color (RGB 204-204-204). 3. Apply the pattern only to areas that might dither badly. Leave borders and other detail lines as solid colors. 4. Adjust the transparency setting for the pattern layer until the pattern is dark enough to mix with the color detail without overwhelming it visually. A 25% transparency with the default secondary 2 color (RGB 153-153-153) produces a good result for most graphics. 5. Test your results on your target 8-bit platforms. 6. If a pattern does not solve your problems, try using additional graphics techniques, such as a gradient. The following table shows the results of graphic reproduction in 8-bit color on different operating systems. Table 4 Variations in Reproduction of 8-Bit Color Styles Original Graphic Microsoft Windows (8 bits) Mac OS (8 bits) CDE (8 bits)
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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly reserved color sets of different platforms, so reserved colors are not guaranteed to reproduce without dithering across platforms. Select colors that do not overwhelm the content of your application or distract users from their tasks. Stay away from saturated hues. For the sake of visual appeal and ease of use, choose groups of muted tones for your interface elements. Since there is no lowest-common-denominator solution for choosing common colors across platforms (or even colors that are guaranteed to reproduce on a single platform), some of the colors in your application graphics will dither when running in 8-bit color. The best strategy is to design images that dither gracefully, as described in the following section. Maximizing Color Quality Images with fine color detail often reproduce better on 8-bit systems than those images that are mapped to a predefined palette (such as the web-safe palette) and use large areas of solid colors. Dithering is less noticeable in small areas, and, for isolated pixels of a given color, dithering simply becomes color substitution. Often colors in the system palette can provide a fair-to-good match with those specified in a GIF file. The overall effect of color substitution in small areas can be preferable to the dithering patterns produced for single colors, or to the limited number of colors resulting from pre-mapping to a given color palette. There are no absolutely safe cross-platform colors. Areas of solid color often dither, producing distracting patterns. One effective way to avoid coarse dithering patterns is to “pre-dither” your artwork intentionally. This approach minimizes obvious patterned dithering on 8-bit systems while still permitting very pleasing effects on systems capable of displaying more than 256 colors. To achieve this effect, overlay a semitransparent checkerboard pattern on your graphics. The following figure shows how to build a graphic using this technique. Figure 43 Adding a Pattern to Avoid Coarse Dithering Patterns
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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly Choosing Graphic File Formats You can use two graphic file formats for images on the Java platform: GIF (Graphics Interchange Format) and JPEG (named after its developers, the Joint Photographic Experts Group). GIF is the common format for application graphics in the Java look and feel. GIF files tend to be smaller on disk and in memory than JPEG files. A GIF file includes a color table (or palette) of up to 256 colors. The number of colors in the table and the complexity of the image are two factors that affect the size of the graphic file. On 8-bit systems, some of the colors specified in a GIF file will be unavailable if they are not part of the system’s current color palette. These unavailable colors will be dithered by the system. On 16-bit and 24-bit systems, more colors are available and different sets of colors can be used in different GIF files. Each GIF image, however, is still restricted to a set of 256 colors. JPEG graphics are generally better suited for photographs than for the more symbolic style of icons, button graphics, and corporate type and logos. JPEG graphics use a compression algorithm that yields varying image quality depending on the compression setting, whereas GIF graphics use lossless compression that preserves the appearance of the original 8-bit image. Choosing Colors At monitor depths greater than 8 bits, most concerns about how any particular color reproduces become less significant. Any system capable of displaying thousands (16 bits) or millions (24 bits) of colors can find a color very close to, or exactly the same as, each value defined in a given image. Newer systems typically display a minimum of thousands of colors. Since each system renders colors slightly differently, different monitors and different platforms might display the same color differently, however. For instance, a given color in one GIF file might look different to the eye from one system to another. Many older monitors or systems still display only 256 colors. For users with these systems, it might be advantageous to use colors known to exist in the system palette of the target platforms. Most platforms include a small set of “reserved” colors that are always available. Unfortunately, these reserved colors are often not useful for visual design purposes or for interface elements because they are highly saturated (the overpowering hues one might expect to find in a basic box of crayons). Furthermore, there is little overlap between the
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Sun - Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, 2nd Edition made by dotneter@teamfly You need to supply icons, button graphics, pictures and logos for splash screens and About boxes. Since these graphics might be displayed on a number of different platforms and configurations, you must develop a strategy for ensuring a high quality of appearance. In addition, you need to ensure that your graphics are meaningful to color-blind users. Strategies for addressing color blindness are similar to those used for handling limited display colors. Use color only as a secondary means of representing important information. Make use of other characteristics (shape, texture, size, or intensity contrast) that do not require color vision or a color monitor. Working With Available Colors The number of colors available on a system is determined by the bit depth, which is the number of bits of information used to represent a single pixel on the monitor. The lowest number of bits used for modern desktop color monitors is usually 8 bits (256 colors); 16 bits provide for thousands of colors (65,536, to be exact); and 24 bits, common on newer systems, provide for millions of colors (16,777,216). The specific colors available on a system are determined by the way in which the target platform allocates colors. Available colors might differ from application to application. Designers sometimes use predefined color palettes when producing images. For example, some web designers work within a set of 216 “web-safe” colors. These colors reproduce in many web browsers without dithering (as long as the system is capable of displaying at least 256 colors). Dithering occurs when a system or application attempts to simulate an unavailable color by using a pattern of two or more colors from the system palette. The main drawback of dithering is the striped (moir ) patterns that can result. Outside web browsers, available colors are not so predictable. Individual platforms have different standard colors or deal with palettes in a dynamic way. The web-safe colors might dither when running in a standalone application, or even in an applet within a browser that usually does not dither these colors. Since the colors available to a Java application can differ each time it is run, especially across platforms, you cannot always avoid dithering in your images. Identify and understand the way that your target platforms handle colors at different bit depths. To achieve your desired effect, test your graphics on all target platforms at depths of 8 bits (that is, 256 colors).
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