User blog:Aaron Larsen/Icon & Map Update

It being a slow-ish time of year for me, work-wise, I thought I'd take the opportunity put together some items I've been meaning to post about here for some time, but just kept not getting around to. All are related to the map/s and info-box icons that I've been creating for the site:

1. Latest Icon Revisions: After getting a bit of feedback and doing some experimenting, I've decided that I think the buffered-yet-thumbnail-less approach is the best looking approach. (For those who are new to the Wikia or haven't seen my previous posts on the subject: The latest icons all have a built-in 3-4 pixel-wide "buffer" built into them so they don't look smashed up against the text. They are meant to be installed "full-sized," on the left, without a thumbnail.)

2. Icon Naming Conventions: In an effort to minimize confusion between old and new versions of the icons, the new ones should all be labelled as "______ Icon." (Previous ones had mostly been named "_____ symbol" or "_______mini" or some such thing.

3. Thumbnails with reduced larger icons: In a few cases, it seemed to me to be a cool idea to instead of using the regular icon in the info-box, to instead use a full-sized drawing of the symbol, but reduced in size, so that the reader could, with just one click, the see a larger, more detailed look at a particularly interesting symbol or variant of one. Examples of this sort of thing off the top of my head so you can go see what I mean include the many uses of the 6th Star Whitestone Crest (and its derivatives) that I put into the info boxes for Percy & Vex. When I'm doing this instead of a normal reduced-pixel icon, I think the thumnail still makes good sense and I've kept it in for all of these situations.

4. Map Update: The latest version of my map set ("New and Improved, now with Xhorhas...") is up and installed on at least the main articles that I could think of to which they are most relevant. As always, feel free to add these maps to any article that they can be helpful to. (Also, if I've missed a place where a map should have been updated to a new standard, feel free to let me know or switch it out yourself.

5. Icon-Map Synergy: In case y'all haven't noticed, I've been gradually tying my map and icon work together by using the icons as map markers as well. The ones that include bold letters are used to spell the corresponding place on the map. Icons that didn't have built-in letters I used to replace the traditional boring map markers. Thus, if you're familiar with either an article's info or with a paticular area of the map, the icon should make quick recognition that much easier between the two.

6. Implementation: I've been gradually chipping away at the task of replacing all the older style icons with newer ones and plan to continue to do so well out into the forseeable future. I'm in no particular hurry, and as far as I'm concerned it's fine y'all want to concentrate on implementing the latest icons in the newer articles, while I concentrate on "fixing" the old ones to get them in line with the new standard.

'''7. Questions/ Comments/ Concerns? ''A's always, please don't hesitate to post a reply here or send me an email with any comments. questions, and/ or concerns.''

Your Friendly Neighborhood Iconographic Cartographer,

A.