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| Icon Style Guide |
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Starting with version 1.2, KDE supports the following categories of icons:
- Low-color normal (32x32) and mini (16x16) icons - which make use of
the 40-color KDE palette presented below
- High-color large (48x48) and normal (32x32) icons - unlimited color palette.
- Toolbar icons (22x22)
The high-color icons are the default (preferred) format. The low-color icons
are provided for compatibility with very old video hardware which puts
limitations on the number of the colors the desktop can use safely.
The user must be able to choose at run time the type of icons that
(s)he will use. Therefore, it is recommended that icons be provided
for all the 4 types that KDE supports. Nevertheless, KDE desktop
intelligently handles icons, using the available ones and scaling them
to the necessary size.
The following list of guidelines is laid down to help you draw icons
that fit in with the K Desktop Environment.
- For low-color icons, it is mandatory to use the 40 colour KDE
icon palette presented below.
- Draw application and filetype icons in hicolor 48x48 and 32x32 sizes as well as low-color 32x32 and 16x16 sizes. Toolbar icons should be size 22x22.
- Outline the major shapes in the icon in black. Give every shape a clean,
hard edge.
- Use the corresponding filetype templates as a base for new filetype icons.
- Make the background of the icons transparent.
- Look over the supplied KDE icons to get an idea of the style used.
For the hicolor icons, Torsten Rahn and the KDE artists team also recommend the following rules to be respected:
- Large icons have to measure 48x48 pixel, have 256 color and are
saved as XPM´s. The total size of the objects on these icons
should measure 44 pixels in width or/and 44 pixels in height!
So there´s a transparent 2-pixel-border around the icon.
- We don´t want to confuse/irritate the user, so:
All icons in 44x44 should be enlarged versions of the
32x32-pixel-icons in KDE 1.1 but using enhanced quality. That
means that all objects that are displayed on the icon have
almost the same perspective and colors as those with 32x32
and 16x16. You may add further details to the picture but
someone who knows the icon for kppp 16x16 or 32x32 well
should also be able to recognize the 44x44 version as being
´the same icon but just in much Much MUCH better quality with
much more details.´ e.g.
If you want to create a completely different icon for any app,
you have to make new versions in 16x16 and 32x32 pixels first.
- Every new icon should match the drawing style of the icons
that already exist
- Icons should have "near-photo-quality".
- Icons from other projects (Windowmaker, Gnome, Windows...)
are not allowed
- If you use photos to create the icons remember: don´t take
any pictures from the web for that (copyright-issues and
uniqueness)
Drawings saved in GIF file format can be turned into icons by the KDE drawing
team.
You can view:
Filetype Templates
| Icon set |
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Standard File |
Source code |
Executable |
Compressed |
Folder
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| Low-color (32x32) |
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| High-color (48x48) |
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Low-color Icon Palette
Each table contains 40 unique colours. There are 6*7 = 42 cells with black
appearing 3 times.
Named Colours
| #303030 |
#585858 |
#808080 |
#a0a0a0 |
#c3c3c3 |
#dcdcdc |
| #400000 |
#004000 |
#000000 |
#404000 |
#004040 |
#000000 |
| #800000 |
#008000 |
#000080 |
#808000 |
#008080 |
#800080 |
| #c00000 |
#00c000 |
#0000c0 |
#c0c000 |
#00c0c0 |
#c000c0 |
| #ff0000 |
#00ff00 |
#0000ff |
#ffff00 |
#00ffff |
#ff00ff |
| #ffc0c0 |
#c0ffc0 |
#c0c0ff |
#ffffc0 |
#c0ffff |
#ffc0ff |
| #ff8000 |
#c05800 |
#ffa858 |
#ffdca8 |
#ffffff |
#000000 |
RGB Values
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