
Hi, I'm trying to create icons for Inkscape's Tango icon set. I noticed that while the icons in the current default set are designed as 16x16 pixel icons, they are rendered as 13X13 icons.
I tried first to recreate the import and export icons. They look fine on the toolbar, but in the menu they don't look well at all. Strangely, the other icons look somewhat better. It almost looks as if the two icons I created are being rescaled using a "nearest neighbor" algorithm instead of interpolation. I checked and double checked - they are exactly on the grid and in the same size as the rest of the icons.
So, I'd like to know, first, as long as this size is used, what should I do to make the icons look OK?
Secondly, why was the 13X13 pixels size used in the first place? As far as I know Inkscape is the only app using this size. I also noticed odd icon sizes both in the SVG file (such as 27X27 icons) and on Ubuntu, some icons that should be small such as the four "affect" buttons at the end of the select and transform toolbar are excessively large.
One more question I'd like to open for debate is, are too many icons used in the menus? Usually, only "important" features get icons, to make them more easily recognizable in a long menu. Giving everything an icon misses the point because easy recognition is no longer possible. We can still have all the icons in the icons.svg file, but I think the number of actually used icons in the menu should be lower.