GNU bug report logs - #62170
29.0.60; the default tool bar icons are ugly to modern users and are not customizable

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From: Eli Zaretskii <eliz <at> gnu.org>
To: Spencer Baugh <sbaugh <at> janestreet.com>
Cc: 62170 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: bug#62170: 29.0.60; the default tool bar icons are ugly to modern users and are not customizable
Date: Tue, 14 Mar 2023 14:43:37 +0200

> From: Spencer Baugh <sbaugh <at> janestreet.com>
> Date: Mon, 13 Mar 2023 16:16:38 -0400
> 
> Proposed solution: it should be possible to configure the icons used
> for a tool bar.

But it already _is_ possible.  You "just" need to find somewhere the
icons you like, call their files by the names Emacs expects (for
example, "new.FOO" for the find-file button, where FOO is an image
extension supported by Emacs), then put them in some directory, and
make sure that directory is in image-load-path before the image
directories installed by "make install".

Alternatively, you can use in your init files functions from
tool-bar.el, such as tool-bar-add-item-from-menu, to override the
default image names used for the buttons; then Emacs will look for
other images.

> Alternatively, we could just throw out the current icons and replace
> them with a minimal and abstract design which hopefully would have
> mass appeal.

We replaced our icons a couple of times on the past.  We can do that
again, if better icons are available.  The difficulty is that for us
to distribute an icon it must be under a Free license.  So either we
have someone on board who could create beautiful icons as part of
his/her work on Emacs, or we find icons produced by someone else which
are distributed under a Free license and import them.

IOW, there's no problem with your proposal except coming up with
better icons we can include in our release tarballs.  It's not like we
are wedded to the current ones or consider them to be the best
inventions since sliced bread.

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