Hi there,
Did you know that Sitecore has a predefined list of standard fields, you can use? It's located directtly in the Sitecore namespace.
So instead of writing:
string iconValue = item.Fields["__icon"].Value;
You write:
string iconValue = item.Fields[Sitecore.FieldIDs.Icon].Value;
I consider this to be a Sitecore 'Best practice', since it prevents you from 'typos'...
Hope this is usefull!
gr,
Robbert