Icons can be wide open to interpretation and combining them with words can remove some of the ambiguity. Take a down arrow icon for example. Does it mean to move something down, lower its priority, or download? Or does an “x” icon mean to delete, disable, or close? The problem becomes larger for light use interfaces where there isn’t much time for the person to learn the meaning of the icons. To make the icons more understandable, they can be augmented with textual labels. If space is truly an issue, some user interfaces compromise by showing all of their icon labels on a single hover (less painful than having to hover on each individual icon).