Change the quill icon to a pencil icon for Compose a new message

This idea has been developed and deployed to Canvas

In the Messages section of Canvas, the way to compose a new message is to click on the icon of a quill. Some students don't even know what a quill is. And several of my students though the quill icon was a picture of a leaf.

A pencil is a standard icon on the web for "edit." Let's make the button easy to find by changing the quill to a pencil. (See attached files for examples.)

Comments from Instructure

For more information, please read through the https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-13988-canvas-production-release-notes-2018-01-27 .

91 Comments
tdelillo
Community Champion

Yes, I followed that whole conversation with interest. I agree with the concerns that "Q" is too English-centric, and I know that choosing a replacement was difficult and subjective. I was just pointing out that other icons have received attention for being somewhat inexplicable.

bwalters1
Community Participant

Isn't the plus sign or a pen on a piece of paper usually an indicator to create a new message? I think either of them would make much more sense that the leaf quill. 

cdoherty
Community Participant

‘+’ or ‘+Message’ would be consistent with many other Canvas tools. 

bwalters1
Community Participant

Yes! Quite right. 

kara_robinson
Community Novice

Agreed!  They would be great icons!

Thinking about it, yes the pen by itself is more of an 'edit' icon, whereas the pen on a piece of paper like  @tchilt  suggested above is the 'compose'.

Whatever it is... just needs to change from the quill/leaf!

kara_robinson
Community Novice

Absolutely!  Nice idea!

rlbrown21
Community Participant

As a designer, its a leaf.  Maybe its supposed to be a quill, but when the majority of people read it as a leaf, its a leaf.  Smiley Happy

bdalton_sales
Instructure
Instructure

I'd be suggesting the envelope icon used on the context cards and mobile app to keep the visual language consistent

gnoack
Community Champion

I think a pencil is pretty standard for compose and/or edit. I also see a lot of plus signs, +.