Lex Spoon wrote:

> As a generalization, aesthetics are hard to obtain by making one change
> at a time.  How about we have a mini-contest to produce a good set of
> preferences that generate a good-looking Squeak screen?  The winner is
> what is used in 3.8, though nice winners would include clear
> improvements that were included in other submissions.
That sounds like a sensible idea. One of the problems is that there are 
so many audiences to cater to. The longer term plan so far as I recall 
is for having
a) a basic image with almost nothing (ie squattish) in it so that 
specialized images can be built up rather than shrunk down
b) an image well suited to typical developer work (tools etc) built from 
a by loading packages
c) a try-me image with everything interesting in there, again built from a.
b would probably benefit from a very plain look optimised for speed 
where possible, whereas c would be a place to set the defaults to as 
much beauty as we can muster - along with easily findable config for 
simpler looks.

One thing I'd urge anyone that feels like tackling the problem to try is 
  reworking the main menus. Why is preferences under appearance - not 
all prefs are to do with looks. Why is garbage collecting under help?
In general the World menu is a really complicated mess right now. 
Perhaps using a hierarchical menu might help a bit - after all the save 
related entries could all go under one main entry, the open, windows and 
changes entries ought to be submenus and so on.

tim