When I used TrueCrypt, the entire tray icon changed color when I had a volume mounted, and I could tell at a glance whether something was mounted or not. VeraCrypt's icon just has a tiny little circle that changes color, and it's much harder to see. I would appreciate something a little more visible :)
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Not going to lie, the icon is a bit of a nightmare if it were to ever be "marketted" correctly to gain interest by the public. I am on a Mac currently so this topic doesn't really affect me but it would be nice to see a much more "slick" looking icon. I have changed out the icon to something more preferable to my custom icon set as the rough edges and pixellated feel weren't cutting it xD
Seb
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New VeraCrypt icon is good, because it is significatly different from TrueCrypt - making these two programs easily distinguishable.
Mouted VeraCrypt volume icon is not good for these reasons:
Mouted icon is different from main VeraCrypt icon (Where is the octactagon VC? Was the icon hidden? Oh it is this one...) The icons(mounted + unmounted) should remain visually highly similar to make it easy to spot the program. It is still the same program, just different status.
Not indicating severity Paradoxically the normal VC icon is more vivid than mounted icon. (Do I have mounted some VC volume? What does this gray lock mean?) Mounted icon should highlight that program is working with sensitive data and it should be visible on first look.
Mounted icon is not contrastive enough When someone is using gray windows taskbar the mounted icon is very badly visible.
I very liked TrueCrypt approach - same icon (shape and content) with just color differency. Blue box with white dotted key - changing to orange when volume is mounted.
I suggest for mounted icon to take the main VC in white octagon and just replace white background with contrasting color (orange, red, ...).
- In addition the exact shade of contrasting color should be tuned up, so that it does not conflict with cyan VC letters.
Indeed, please give a better design. E.g. the hexagram in a different color. As it is now it is unreadable. It needs to be immediately clear. The hexagram as such is good.
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I agree!
I would like a gray unlocked icon when no volume is mounted and a golden locked icon when a volume is mounted!
And I see this icon only in a very small size, so the two icons should not be similar.
Thx!
I have also started having an issue with VeraCrypt's icon.
I used to resource-edit the executable to get the icons that I wanted, but recent versions of VeraCrypt has (understandably) started signing the executable to prevent alteration, meaning that this option is no longer possible. When I upgraded VeraCrypt it was extremely jarring to suddenly lose the icons that I had become so familiar with over the years (which I had always previously been able to swap out in earlier versions of VeraCrypt).
My main issue with the icon is that because the unmounted VC logo icon has a white background (bad design choice for a tray icon) it makes it look so much smaller than all of the other icons in the tray. It looks like what you see when the system's icon cache has become corrupted, or when a tray application has not loaded properly so its icon is messed up.
Here's the VeraCrypt tray icon (left), versus my custom version (right)
Of course, my particular icon choice will not suit everybody. The wide variety of opinions earlier in this thread makes it clear that everyone will have a different icon preference. But this entire issue could be easily solved for everyone by simply having the ability to specify icon choice in VeraCrypt.
This does not require any additional UI work to add further options to VeraCrypt's settings page, it could simply be activated based on icons of a particular name being present in the root folder of VeraCrypt. If those correctly named icons exist (in the correct file format and location) then those icons would replace the default VeraCrypt icons. But if one or both icons are not present, then VeraCrypt automatically falls back to using its own internal icons, as it always has done.
This would mean that no existing VeraCrypt user would be affected by this change. Everything will look and feel exactly the same as it does now, so no inconvenience would be caused. But for those users who do want different icons, then they can just drop them into the VeraCrypt folder and they will automatically be used.
Of course there are more comprehensive ways to achieve this (such as being able to specify icon path etc.) but for simplicity, the option I described above would seem to be the easiest way to provide a complete solution with minimal disruption and the least coding / design effort.
SUMMARY (TL;DR)
Let users choose their own icons by dropping icon files into VeraCrypt's folder. If icons are present then they get used. If not, then VeraCrypt uses its own internal icons (as usual).
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I think Lem's idea is good. But it requires development all the same.
I'm agree with the original logic, as before with truecrypt: default icon + colored icon for mounted volumes.
So I'm contributing to the project by offering new icons for Veracrypt (I still added the strange gray model if needed (for problematic volumes?)).
The zip file attached contain 2 models. The first one is based on the current icon, which is colorized (orange, wink at the famouse gold of truecrypt). But as some have explained, it's not very noticeable because using a hexagon makes the icon small.
So I suggest a second model to forget the hexagon (veracrypt is not a beehive), so: let's go back to a cylinder, more symbolic of a storage volume. Thus the trayicon would be bigger in the taskbar !
I was here to search for something else, but this tray icon thread caught my attention. Like others above, I also have difficulties to easily spot the VC tray icon and interprete the status correctly.
Let's keep asking for this. Still thanks to all who contribute. This is a great piece of software and I am so happy that TrueCrypt was revived in VC.
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I too agree with you that the icon is not clearly visible and I prefer TrueCrypt's mode where the color is simply changed.
I have also noticed a difference in the display of drives letter: for example, TrueCrypt automatically selects the first free drive when opening the interface, so I can immediately do mounting or unmounting without selecting it. Also with VeraCrypt it also shows drives A: and B: while TrueCrypt starts with the letter D: but would be more convenient if VeraCrypt could hide some letters according to the user's preference.
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I used to resource-edit the executable to get the icons that I wanted, but recent versions of VeraCrypt has (understandably) started signing the executable to prevent alteration, meaning that this option is no longer possible.
Unless Veracrypt has decided to stop signing their executables recently (which seems highly unlikely) then this method will still not work.
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When I used TrueCrypt, the entire tray icon changed color when I had a volume mounted, and I could tell at a glance whether something was mounted or not. VeraCrypt's icon just has a tiny little circle that changes color, and it's much harder to see. I would appreciate something a little more visible :)
I would appreciate that too!
I agree. :)
I would be great to see VeraCrypt icon improved.
Not going to lie, the icon is a bit of a nightmare if it were to ever be "marketted" correctly to gain interest by the public. I am on a Mac currently so this topic doesn't really affect me but it would be nice to see a much more "slick" looking icon. I have changed out the icon to something more preferable to my custom icon set as the rough edges and pixellated feel weren't cutting it xD
Seb
Can you share your icon for forum feedback or is the icon not available for free usage?
I think this is still not resolved.
Mouted icon is different from main VeraCrypt icon (Where is the octactagon VC? Was the icon hidden? Oh it is this one...) The icons(mounted + unmounted) should remain visually highly similar to make it easy to spot the program. It is still the same program, just different status.
Not indicating severity Paradoxically the normal VC icon is more vivid than mounted icon. (Do I have mounted some VC volume? What does this gray lock mean?) Mounted icon should highlight that program is working with sensitive data and it should be visible on first look.
Mounted icon is not contrastive enough When someone is using gray windows taskbar the mounted icon is very badly visible.
I very liked TrueCrypt approach - same icon (shape and content) with just color differency. Blue box with white dotted key - changing to orange when volume is mounted.
I suggest for mounted icon to take the main VC in white octagon and just replace white background with contrasting color (orange, red, ...).
- In addition the exact shade of contrasting color should be tuned up, so that it does not conflict with cyan VC letters.
Last edit: jetelina 2016-06-19
Mounted icon (with grey keys) sucks indeed. Please, give us slighly different native octagon icon.
Indeed, please give a better design. E.g. the hexagram in a different color. As it is now it is unreadable. It needs to be immediately clear. The hexagram as such is good.
I agree!
I would like a gray unlocked icon when no volume is mounted and a golden locked icon when a volume is mounted!
And I see this icon only in a very small size, so the two icons should not be similar.
Thx!
I miss old truecrypt icon :(
I have also started having an issue with VeraCrypt's icon.
I used to resource-edit the executable to get the icons that I wanted, but recent versions of VeraCrypt has (understandably) started signing the executable to prevent alteration, meaning that this option is no longer possible. When I upgraded VeraCrypt it was extremely jarring to suddenly lose the icons that I had become so familiar with over the years (which I had always previously been able to swap out in earlier versions of VeraCrypt).
My main issue with the icon is that because the unmounted VC logo icon has a white background (bad design choice for a tray icon) it makes it look so much smaller than all of the other icons in the tray. It looks like what you see when the system's icon cache has become corrupted, or when a tray application has not loaded properly so its icon is messed up.
Here's the VeraCrypt tray icon (left), versus my custom version (right)
Of course, my particular icon choice will not suit everybody. The wide variety of opinions earlier in this thread makes it clear that everyone will have a different icon preference. But this entire issue could be easily solved for everyone by simply having the ability to specify icon choice in VeraCrypt.
This does not require any additional UI work to add further options to VeraCrypt's settings page, it could simply be activated based on icons of a particular name being present in the root folder of VeraCrypt. If those correctly named icons exist (in the correct file format and location) then those icons would replace the default VeraCrypt icons. But if one or both icons are not present, then VeraCrypt automatically falls back to using its own internal icons, as it always has done.
This would mean that no existing VeraCrypt user would be affected by this change. Everything will look and feel exactly the same as it does now, so no inconvenience would be caused. But for those users who do want different icons, then they can just drop them into the VeraCrypt folder and they will automatically be used.
Of course there are more comprehensive ways to achieve this (such as being able to specify icon path etc.) but for simplicity, the option I described above would seem to be the easiest way to provide a complete solution with minimal disruption and the least coding / design effort.
SUMMARY (TL;DR)
Let users choose their own icons by dropping icon files into VeraCrypt's folder. If icons are present then they get used. If not, then VeraCrypt uses its own internal icons (as usual).
Hi everybody,
I think Lem's idea is good. But it requires development all the same.
I'm agree with the original logic, as before with truecrypt: default icon + colored icon for mounted volumes.
So I'm contributing to the project by offering new icons for Veracrypt (I still added the strange gray model if needed (for problematic volumes?)).
The zip file attached contain 2 models. The first one is based on the current icon, which is colorized (orange, wink at the famouse gold of truecrypt). But as some have explained, it's not very noticeable because using a hexagon makes the icon small.
So I suggest a second model to forget the hexagon (veracrypt is not a beehive), so: let's go back to a cylinder, more symbolic of a storage volume. Thus the trayicon would be bigger in the taskbar !
Edit : see attached file updated
Enjoy!
Best regards.
Graphys
Last edit: Graphys 2022-09-01
Nice work, Graphys!
I was here to search for something else, but this tray icon thread caught my attention. Like others above, I also have difficulties to easily spot the VC tray icon and interprete the status correctly.
Let's keep asking for this. Still thanks to all who contribute. This is a great piece of software and I am so happy that TrueCrypt was revived in VC.
I too agree with you that the icon is not clearly visible and I prefer TrueCrypt's mode where the color is simply changed.
I have also noticed a difference in the display of drives letter: for example, TrueCrypt automatically selects the first free drive when opening the interface, so I can immediately do mounting or unmounting without selecting it. Also with VeraCrypt it also shows drives A: and B: while TrueCrypt starts with the letter D: but would be more convenient if VeraCrypt could hide some letters according to the user's preference.
For what its worth, you can easily replace these icons directly within the VeraCrypt.exe file to whatever you want.
For example, using Graphys icons he gave above you can do this:
The only real flaw is when vc updates u will have to go through the same steps again.
Last edit: Kelly Roo 2023-06-01
You must have not read my post (above).
Unless Veracrypt has decided to stop signing their executables recently (which seems highly unlikely) then this method will still not work.