Newsgroups: comp.cog-eng
Path: utzoo!henry
From: henry@utzoo.uucp (Henry Spencer)
Subject: Re: Cross-linguistic issues in the design of Icons
Message-ID: <1989Aug20.005726.27233@utzoo.uucp>
Organization: U of Toronto Zoology
References: <9268@cs.Buffalo.EDU> <1985@softway.oz>
Date: Sun, 20 Aug 89 00:57:26 GMT

In article <1985@softway.oz> gary@softway.oz (Friend of Elvenkind) writes:
>If you are interested in creating universal icons then you are going to have 
>to design them with aliens from another planet in mind as your readers.  I
>have a feeling that for every icon useful to your own culture there will exist
>an alternate culture which would not understand it.  Can anyone suggest a
>universal icon?

I think the one for "explosion hazard" is probably fairly universal; you
have to make some fairly drastic assumptions to make it incomprehensible.
-- 
V7 /bin/mail source: 554 lines.|     Henry Spencer at U of Toronto Zoology
1989 X.400 specs: 2200+ pages. | uunet!attcan!utzoo!henry henry@zoo.toronto.edu