I'm facing a UX struggle that I've never noticed before, and even though the behaviour is what everyone expects, feels right, and is fine, in the end, it's just not consistent. Let me explain.
You have a music control, say, in any playlist app.
You have the Play/pause button, usually a volume bar (that is irrelevant here), and a Mute/Unmute button.
All those controls are "toggles", they stay in their state until you press them again. Again, I'm keeping it simple and ignoring the fact that the volume bar at 0% might switch the mute button to visually show there is no sound, but that's not the point here.
Let me get to it.
If I look at the pause button, it's displaying the state I can go to ; I'm currently playing, and I can switch to pause. It's displaying my future state.
While the mute button is displaying my current state. It's a little speaker icon with waves on the side, and this is my current state. Pressing it will show a speaker with a strike on it (please edit to correct my english here). It's displaying my current state.
Both these buttons switch my current state to the opposite state, they're both toggles, but both have opposite behaviours in terms of UI. Yet, this is what everyone expects and even I agree with it.
Still, it seems inconsistent, I wouldn't do it like that with any other control than that specific music situation.
Does anyone know why? How? Is it historical? Is there a reason I'm overlooking? This is really itching me.