[OSM-talk] icon style guide

[Thom Shannon]

We have a lot of icons being created for maps, from an aesthetic point 
of view they vary pretty wildly. Conveying the right information in a 
tiny little graphic is a real art unto itself.

Some examples:
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Proposed_Icons

It would be great if we get some design focused people involved and 
start to put together a nice coherent icon set. We should also look at 
what we really need icons for and what items could share a common icon, 
eg. do we need a different icon for different types of power station? 
Why not have one power station icon. Creating endless icons for 
everything can really clutter and confuse the map.

Perhaps we could have an icon style guide, I'm imagining something 
similar to this one Microsoft published for XP style icons
http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms997636.aspx.

We should also look to follow conventions as much as possible, we don't 
copy Ordance Survey roads, but that doesn't mean we can't follow their 
lead on some symbols. They'd be redrawn of course but if people 
recognise a knife and fork as a place to eat at then that's what we 
should use.