Icon memory usage in DestroyTwitter
In the next release of DestroyTwitter, I’m introducing a new icon preference. It lets the user choose whether they want small icons, big icons, or none at all. The choice is not entirely a visual one, but also one of resource usage.
The above profiler tests show the memory usage between the three options. As you can see, there’s a startling difference between DestroyTwitter when it has icons compared to when it doesn’t. That was expected to some degree, but what’s also interesting is the how slight the difference is between small and big icon memory usage. Since the big icons have 33% more bitmap data than the small ones, I assumed the margin would be greater than 641 kb.
Throughout development of DestroyTwitter, an option for bigger icons has always been high on the list of most requested features. I always pushed it to the side, claiming it would use a considerable amount of memory compared to the current size. After performing these tests, it’s safe to say that the difference is minimal. If you prefer a larger icon, you’re not going take a hit. With the option for no icons, however, are you tempted to go for text only?
I really prefer the small icons, like the actually.
I think text only is fine as long as the account name associated with a tweet is easy to find.
Maybe there is a way to only load the Icon’s that are currently on screen. Then, as tweets come up or are scrolled to, they load into memory, and then back out as go out of view. Note that I have no idea if this is even possible from a technical perspective, just thinking out loud. Love DT!
Think I’ll go big icons!
Being able to see “who” is tweeting is what gets me to slow down when catching up on unread tweets. Filtering/Group is just too time consuming…
After 2 weeks of giving Twirl ago, I’m back. Fact is DT’s interface is just so pleasant to use. The colours (https://destroytwitter.com/themes/7e), the font, the spacing around stuff, the difference between read/unread, easily able to look at people’s profile, then see their tweets. The sum of the little things equates to the grand total of awesome that is DT
Cheers,
Nick
I would probably go for big icons as well. Icons just make much faster to identify who’s writing (specially for someone with a highly visual memory such as myself). I’m happy to see that’s one the table, and that it wouldn’t take much more resources.
I’ll definitely be switching to large icons. I’ve been looking forward to this feature for some time now. Thanks!
Bigger fonts are way higher on my wishlist than bigger icons.
If you have used a native twitter app for a while and then you re-open destroytwitter, then you’ll scare how tiny the icons were/are.
I’ll certainly be trying out no icons. If I can’t manage without, then large it is.
Personally one of the things I love about DT is the tiny font. That way so much more can be packed into a single column compared to say TD. It also makes things so much sleeker.
As for the icons, Im more textually oriented anyway, so I say off with their heads!
Love DT. Havent used any other apps since somebody recommended it a few months back.
in twitterific it looks like “twowheels > text of my update”. I hadn’t really thought about icons – or lack thereof – on twitter until I started using twitterific on my iphone, but I love having no icon…allows me to quickly scan updates.