Assigning shapes to things

Complex 'things' need to be represented visually in product UIs, presentations, and marketing. We have struggled forever with how to represent them clearly and equally, and make the representations seem natural. I have been playing around with assigning a shape to the 'thing' - in this case APIs and Apps - then focussing on use of the shape to create symbols and icons to represent various tools and capabilities of the platform. I chose to represent APIs with the hex - a solid and flexible shape, but not commonly associated with "APIs". The triangle is a legacy shape that represents the apps focus of the original products, and was used as a brand marker in the early versions of those products.

:)