What’s Good for the iOS Goose Is Often Not Good for the MacOS Gander

Tobias Steinke, replying on Mastodon to my “Apple Should Eliminate the App Icon ‘Squircle Jail’” piece:

But iOS app icons (and iPadOS) were always in squircle shape. Why

is and was this okay for you, but it’s not for macOS?

This is a good and fair question. But I not only have an answer, I have an answer that clarifies why this entire debate is important. That “design is how it works” applies even to something as seemingly superficial as icons.

There are all sorts of limitations and simplifications in iOS that would be bad ideas to bring to MacOS, which would range in effect from disappointing to frustrating to maddening to ruinous. Where squircle jail falls on that scale is subjective. It’s certainly not ruinous, but I’d say it’s maddening. (iOS baby-computer-isms that would be ruinous to bring to MacOS would include killing AppKit, removing the Unix terminal layer, or requiring all apps to come from the App Store.)