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The Gimp Graphics Software

The GIMP Gets Ready for 2.2 478

Posted by michael from the photoshop-looking-worried dept.
An anonymous contributor writes "As promised, this time it didn't take another 3 years for a new stable GIMP version to be released. 8 months after GIMP 2.0 hit the road, GIMP 2.2 is almost done. The GIMP developers released 2.2-pre2 today and unless any major problems show up, the GIMP 2.2.0 release is going to follow later this month. The GIMP Wiki has a comprehensive list of new features in GIMP 2.2 and here are some screenshots of the development version."
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The GIMP Gets Ready for 2.2 More

The GIMP Gets Ready for 2.2

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  • GIMP on Windows vs Linux (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dan dan the dna man ( 461768 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @05:36AM (#10879961) Homepage Journal
    I wonder if the GIMP is slightly more useable on Windows in its next incarnation? I have been raving about the GIMP to anyone who will listen, for most people I know it's a very worthy replacement for Photoshop.

    However I recently set up a dual boot laptop for my gf (the only way she will boot into Linux though is to play FreeCiv ;)) and put the GIMP on XP for her. When she complained it was unusable, I didn't believe her - I've found it very intuitive under Linux. But after trying it on XP, it really does feel like a crippled version of the package I know and love - it's clunky, ugly and restrictive.

    Now of course, she is using a commercial package derived from a bittorrent source, and my OSS evangelism has fallen flat on its face :/

    • There are two main reasons for this instability under windows. The first is the irregular fashion in which GTK fixes and enhancements are ported to windows-- usually at least several weeks and occasionally several months behind the linux verions typically due to testing cycles. The second is in the gimp dev cycle itself in that (and this seems common to most windows ports of OSS to windows) it's always down to one or two people to do the rather labor intensive and unrewarding task of setting up the windows

    • I've found it very intuitive under Linux. But after trying it on XP, it really does feel like a crippled version of the package

      Why didn't you install The GIMP on Linux then? She was already using Linux for FreeCiv anyway.

  • Why? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Why is this is the "developer" section?
    • > Why is this in the 'developer' section?

      Presumably so I can remind the developers to get their act together and add slicing functionality, like Fireworks and, later, Photoshop have done.

      That's the big feature that's holding up efficient web dev with the GIMP. For an image tool to be practical, you need to be able to run off 10 or twenty adjacent (but arbitrarily arranged) sub-images in one step, from the one master file. It was the feature that originally gave Fireworks the jump on Photoshop for a y

      • Re:Why? -- For slicing, obviously! (Score:3, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward
        For real web development work, you should be using CSS and you can save http overhead by sending a single image and /slicing/ it with CSS, as demonstrated here [alistapart.com]! The only thing holding back 'efficient web dev' is the dominant browser:-(

  • Can I not have so many floating boxes? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Magickcat ( 768797 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @05:39AM (#10879969)
    Gimp seems like a really good graphics package, but I still really struggle with the fact that it opens all these seperate boxes that I have to move around. I just want them snapped into a background.

    I want the good old Photoshop/Illustrator/Dreamweaver layout, without having to shuffle 4 floating tool windows about that do different stuff. I'm sure that there is a really good reason to the layout, but I just can't get beyond this unusual interface, and just switch to windows graphics packages because of it.

    Even if I make the image take up my whole screen, I don't like the fact that the tool window etc can wander around and aren't fixed - like every other graphics package that I've ever used. Why oh why does it have to be different?
    • Absolutely agreed. I haven't used it in quite a while myself for that very reason - it's probably very useful for some people that multitask like mad, but for me I like to have all windows within an app nailed down to some degree.

      Admittedly, though, this may have changed since the last time I used it? If such an option's been added, I'd be happy to chuck the alternative!
    • I can never quite understand this argument, no matter how many times I hear it. Take out the MAIN window in photoshop, the one that serves as a dock and menu interface, and you have several floating windows. Exactly the same as the gimp.
      • That's just fine if you're only running Gimp. But if you have other applications running, you'll see them in the background between the gimp windows which is distracting (unless you bother to minimize them each time you switch applications).

        Also, gimp clutters up the task bar, which makes it harder to switch applications, and means that when you want to switch to gimp you will have to click each of the gimp taskbar buttons instead of clicking just one.

        • I'm going to assume that you have multiple desktops. Fairly common for a linux system, to a lesser extent in Windows even though the feature has been around for a while.

          Go to a clean desktop, start gimp, do whatever you want to do. Use another desktop for running whatever else you need/want to run at the same time. Now, I know that in the window manager I use (fluxbox), tasks that are running on one desktop are not shown in the taskbar of another desktop.

          With this setup (which seems intuitive to me) I

          • Not an answer (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 21, 2004 @10:10AM (#10880686)
            you posted a workaround. The original problem still exists. I use 8 desktops and it is still a problem. Whether I use a desktop strictly for the Gimp, or I end up opening other applications (like my file browser to keep files handy for use in Gimp, like Composer to try out the file after editing, like other apps that get used at the same time as Gimp). Even if you use one desktop just for the Gimp, other windows of other apps often get opened and stay opened so you can work productively with the Gimp. And this problem gets magnified on screens smaller than 19".

            Another problem is gimp tool windows opening up underneath other windows.

            The top poster is bringing up a problem. That's how they get addresses. Most of the gimp defenders in this /. story are jumping on the people posting problems about the app, instead of acknowledging that the poster may have a point. That's not how things get fixed.

            I use gimp exclusively because I can't afford Photoshop and won't use windows. And yes, Gimp does things differently than Photoshop. Many gimp defenders are saying to take a month and learn how to use Gimp properly. Wrong. That's not how it works. Either it is intuitive, like Photoshop, or someone moves on to something else that works for them. Today, and many times in the past, I've seen gimp defenders post that Photoshop seems counter-intuitive, and Gimp seems intuitive to them. Maybe if they've been using FOSS, GNU/Linux since it was a multi-floppy download. But intuitive Gimp is not. I'm not a graphic artist, nor a graphic or artistic professional. I use the Gimp for hobby purposes such as touching up photos for amateur web sites, touching up photos for printing, creating banners, buttons, and am starting to use it for slightly more involved image creation. But I still find old versions of Photoshop (4.0, 5.0, 5.5) easier to use for many (not all) actions. I'm no expert, and haven't walked through every page of every manual and guide on Gimp, but I have quite a few downloaded, and have gone through some of the ones that are laid out like a photo-manual. A good basic one is on that site where the guy goes nuts on Microsoft every once in a while, Mozilla magazine, or something like that. But with Photoshop, I can draw a straight line, I can pick specific images out of a photo and transfer just the specific images (without adjoining images or background from the same photo) to other photos, etc. I still haven't figured out how to draw a straight line (I know its documented elsewhere), nor have I figured out how to isolate and move specific images from a photo to another photo, or crop everything else out of a photo except the specific image in the photo. In Photoshop, my brother, who doesn't know what version of windows he's using, doesn't know how to access the web on his dsl account without opening AOL (byos) and using AOL's interface, doesn't know how to upgrade an app like firefox to the newest version, doesn't know how to install and use spyware detection tools, doesn't know much at all about computers is still right at home in using Photoshop to manipulate images for posting on ebay. He can draw straight lines, isolate specific images in a photo and transfer it to another photo or crop everything else, and do other simple and not so simple things that I find difficult or impossible to do on gimp without reading manuals or taking a course. He didn't read any manuals to figure out what to do in Photoshop.

            Am I slamming Gimp? No. I'm pointing out that there are usability problems in Gimp, and they won't get solved if we keep our heads in the sand about them. If the Gimp developers go on believing that there is nothing wrong with the Gimp, and the problem lies with the user, there will continue to be usability problems with the application.

            I'm not a developer. I'm not a programmer. I am contributing in my own small way to a few other projects though, as an end user. I've actually paid for Free Software. I've submitted bugs with detailed ex

            • Re:Not an answer (Score:4, Insightful)

              by BigSven ( 57510 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @11:07AM (#10880974) Homepage
              Thanks for your insightful remarks. While reading this, I felt I should add a comment here. Not directly in reply to what you have said but more as a response to a complaint that seems to come up frequently.

              Some people seem to have the impression that the GIMP developers would believe that the GIMP user interface would be perfect and must not be changed. I wonder how that impression has come up since of course we see the problems and we listen to users reporting usability problems or suggesting enhancements. It's just that code doesn't fall from the sky and changes take time. Of course not everyone agrees with the priorities that the GIMP developers set and not everyone likes the solutions that we come up with. These are points that can and should be discussed on a technical level.

              Whoever claims that the GIMP developers would be ignoring problems is quite ignorant himself. What do you think why I (and other GIMP developers) go through the hassle of reading the slashdot comments at all? Because it's a good way to get user feedback and perhaps in between all those flamebaits someone even comes up with a good idea and/or reasonable arguments.
        • GIMP's layout is fine on Linux, where you can just put it on a separate desktop. But it's hell in Windows. I agree completely with this complaint; there are too many windows, and it doesn't feel like they're all tied together in a common program.

    • Re:Can I not have so many floating boxes? (Score:5, Informative)

      by Yorrike ( 322502 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @05:48AM (#10879987) Journal
      I want the good old Photoshop/Illustrator/Dreamweaver layout, without having to shuffle 4 floating tool windows about that do different stuff.

      Then drag the tools you want into the tool window. You have all the tools in one window and your image in another. It's a far superior layout to that of PS.

    • Same here, I want all the little windows inside another big window, just as in photoshop. Photoshop has a more "gimp" alike system on the mac, and it really really sucks ass bigtime. Same with apps like codewarrior. Fortunatly they gave taht one a "not one million little windows cluttering up everything" mode for windows, which made it as least useful.

      • Re:Can I not have so many floating boxes? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by BenjyD ( 316700 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @06:02AM (#10880029)
        Doesn't the mac have a kind of "sheet of glass" model for applications? So it behaves as if each application is stuck on its own sheet of glass, stacked on the desktop, and you choose which one to bring to the front - so that clicking on any window in an app brings up all the application's windows?

        That would be my ideal GIMP behaviour, anyway.
        • I am very thankful MacOS X doesn't have that kind of behavior. It's very nice to be able to mix windows from different applications without calling them all up to the forefront. If you do want to easily call up all of an app's windows, simply click on its Dock icon or command-tab until you reach that app. For most things, however, being able to call up only a single window from a particular app to the front is a godsend, especially as you work between apps, and use drag-n-drop...
      • Your options:
        1) Install GNU/Linux or one of the BSDs and marvel at the "wonder" of virtual desktops.
        2) But Photoshop and leave us alone.
        3) Get out your text editor and compiler (or get something to do it for you, the GIMP developers aren't interested right now).
    • Having used both programs, it's not the toolboxes themselves that are the problem; whenever I use Photoshop, I move all the tools onto my second monitor so that there's nothing to obscure my view of the image I'm working on (so in that sense there's not much difference between Photoshop and the GIMP). What I feel gives Photoshop the edge is the refinement and consistency of the tools themselves. Having been around and receiving user feedback for so long, Photoshop's tools have been refined to the point wh
    • but you are pronouncing it right :-)

      The thing is, the org. Gimp'rs like the UI as it is (including me) - and 'them' & myself wouldn't like it to change.

      Allthough, I'm open miden (enough) to understand that others 'frown' on it. And that you're just used to a different set of mind - in contrast to 'us'. (I see nothing wrong with that, quite the opposite - a diverse culture is a good thing *IMHO*)

      So, my proposal would be, to have a GIMP with a UI that can 'morph' between the too by checking for som

    • Absolutely, completely agreed.

      Having "grown up" with Photoshop, Paint Shop Pro and Illustrator, the idea of having 4 totally separate windows for the toolbars doesn't sit well with me. I realise that their floating palettes are effectively windows, but they're different (smaller title bars, slightly different behaviour).

      One thing that might help, if the single window model is impossible, could be if they "snapped" to, say, 2 pixels of the desktop edge (as they do in Photoshop) and remember their position
    • Couldn't agree more.

      The transition cost is significant with all the floating windows. Found it frustrating when moving back and forth.

      Realize everyone who uses gimp loves this setup, but for those of us transitioning from almost any other graphics toolset it is a bit of a difficult transition.
    • There is a reason, though it's not particularly a good one. Sort of the same reason that early version of the Visual Basic IDE and all the OSX software runs like that. And it's kind of dumb, but with a separate virtual desktop it really isn't that big of a deal, and hardly something that is really in need of changing.

      Some things that do need changing about The GIMP are the filters and brush quality, which in general give very poor results compared to those in Photoshop. Also I'd really like layer style

    • I think you'd hate Photoshop on MacOS just as much. It also uses lots of floating palettes, etc.

      I, on the other hand, flip out completely trying to use what I find to be a horrible MDI interface for Phoshop on Windows. I find both the GIMP and Photoshop/Mac <i>much</i> more usable than Photoshop/Windows.

      On X11, GIMP's "native" environment, it's possible to control all this stuff at the window manager level (assuming your window manager is not too dumbed down to let you - grr). You can lock win
    • Gimp seems like a really good graphics package, but I still really struggle with the fact that it opens all these seperate boxes that I have to move around. I just want them snapped into a background.

      Then get a better windowmanager. Seriously. That way, you will be able to get the boxes to do exactly what you want, irrespective of what the GIMP developers think is a good idea. Gimp is good at editing images and it should stay that way. Window managers are good at managing windows. Let each component do wh
    • I'm actually amazed that gimp has the ability to drag the window tabs between windows. I could have sworn Adobe had a patent on that and Macromedia had gotten in trouble with it either with flash or freehand or something.

      One thing I applaud the gimp team on, though, is the fact that it's not just a photoshop clone. They didn't try to clone every feature and place everything in the same places. They actually had support for certain things before photoshop supported it (ie- non-square pixels and better histo

    • Re:Can I not have so many floating boxes? (Score:5, Informative)

      by AstroDrabb ( 534369 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @01:54PM (#10881853)
      Do you know you can change the Gimp interface? I have all my windows docked into one. It is _really_ easy to do and here is a quick little page I put up just now to show you. One window Gimp [rr.com]. You can get a nice installer for the latest Gimp from here [sourceforge.net].

      The default Gimp layout is actaully the same as the default Photoshop layout under Mac. I personally do not like the Photoshop layout under MS Windows. If I maximize the image I am working on, all the other docked tool windows are always topmost and cover parts of the image. With Gimp, I have every tool window docked into one nice main tool panel. If I need to change a tool, I just alt+tab, select the tool and then alt+tab back to the maximized image with nothing covering the image.

  • Three steps before GIMP is taken seriously. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Sunday November 21, 2004 @05:45AM (#10879981)
    1. Someone clone the Photoshop interface please. Yes, OSS or not, the interface does matter.
    2. Yes, color (or if you prefer, colour) management is important.
    3. GTK widgets look about as good as OSX without Aqua. Yes, OSS or not, looks do matter, and our eyes will thank you for it.

    • Re:Three steps before GIMP is taken seriously. (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Don't like the GTK+ widget defaults? Use GTK-Engines to skin them.

    • Re:Three steps before GIMP is taken seriously. (Score:5, Insightful)

      by arose ( 644256 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @06:56AM (#10880147)
      1. Yes interface matters, don't break it, for those who grok it. Improvements like from 1.2 to 2.0 are the way to go.
      2. If you need it right now you'll need to look elsewhere. There are many, many applications for a raster editor where colour management does not matter.
      3. I love the Smooth theme, many swear by Industrial, others like the simple default. I also find Aqua too bright, the stripes bother me and the glass buttons hard to read. But if you can make a better GTK theme, by all means start up GIMP (lack of colour management shouldn't hinder you here) or Photoshop (if that's your preference) and get going.

    • you forgot (Score:5, Insightful)

      by michaelnz ( 701047 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @07:45AM (#10880271) Homepage
      4. Change the name to something that can be taken seriously.

      I like Gimp but I'm sorry, the name has got to go. If I'm proposing to my school to provide a piece of software on all campus computers it has to have a name that isn't this offensive.

      • Re:you forgot (Score:2, Insightful)

        by mike2R ( 721965 )
        I agree, I know it must have sentimental attachment for a lot of people, but it's a real factor in slowing adoption.

        FOSS applications are great if you're trying to supply low-cost computers, but not if you have to explain the name to each and every customer - it's just not worth the hassle.

  • Copy and paste (Score:4, Interesting)

    by BenjyD ( 316700 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @05:56AM (#10880015)

    Improved ability to copy and paste between GIMP and other applications, including OpenOffice and Abiword.

    Yes! The number of times I've seen Linux newbies ask "Why can't I copy and paste from GIMP" is huge. Looks to be a great release

  • More than 24bpp support (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Ace Rimmer ( 179561 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @06:10AM (#10880044)
    Yeah, fine, nice features but I wonder why there is nearly no interest in supporting more than 8bits per color. There is a lot of digital cameras out there, I scan my photos in 48bit mode. It's pretty annoying to to the basic color adjustments in (unstable and ugly) cinepaint which I have to restart after each load/save to avoid a crash and then to continue editing the image in gimp2. If more features are added it will be even harder to make everything properly work in a greater color depth.

    Another thing that I miss for a long time is 'macro recording' similar to MS Office or Photoshop actions. Why do I have to write some weird script-fu skeletons and look up for functions and their parameters? It would be much easier if I could record my actions and then to parametrize them some way...

    I asked about this at mailing list but the replies were a bit vague about those topics (or even angry)...

    • Re:More than 24bpp support (Score:5, Informative)

      by BigSven ( 57510 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @06:20AM (#10880071) Homepage
      Both features you ask for are on the TODO. The GIMP developers are fully aware of the need for higher color depths. Color management is scheduled to be added in the next development cycle. Whether this also means support for 16bit per color in GIMP 2.4 remains to be seen. At some point it will definitely be added.

      Macro recording needs a major redesign of the PDB but there are plans to finally address this. Nothing promised because this is entirely a volunteers' project. New features are added if and only if someone's capable and willing to put some time and effort into it.

    • CinePaint does this (Score:5, Informative)

      by sootman ( 158191 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @10:58AM (#10880931) Homepage Journal
      CinePaint [sourceforge.net], formerly Film Gimp [sourceforge.net], "...is a free open source painting and image retouching program designed to work best with 35mm film and other high resolution high dynamic range images. It is the most popular open source tool in the motion picture industry -- used in 2 Fast 2 Furious, Scooby-Doo, Harry Potter, Stuart Little and other feature films. CinePaint is used for painting of background mattes and for frame-by-frame retouching of movies. It is being extended to do film restoration. CinePaint is available for Linux, Macintosh OS X, Windows, and other popular operating systems... CinePaint Features: ... 8/16/32-bits of color per channel (up to 128-bits RGBA)"
  • Not much on the new scripting engine. Is it still scheme? I'm fairly open minded as far as languages go, but scheme is the most horrifying I have ever seen.

    I would like to be able to write scripts using another language, maybe using something like SWIG if it is really needed.

    • Re:Tiny-fu (Score:5, Informative)

      by BigSven ( 57510 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @06:50AM (#10880134) Homepage
      Besides Script-Fu and its successor Tiny-Fu, there's Perl, Python and Lua [gimp.org] for you to choose from. There also used to be Java bindings and probably others but I am not sure if these have been updated for GIMP 2.x yet. Generally, all the functionality is available in a well-defined API and it is not a big deal to write a binding that allows you to write scripts/plug-ins in your favorite programming language.

    • Re:Tiny-fu (Score:4, Informative)

      by arose ( 644256 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @07:00AM (#10880162)
      Python scripting is in since 2.0 AFAIK.

  • Give us 16-bit color! (Score:2, Insightful)

    by puusism ( 136657 )
    With the advent of digital cameras and inexpensive film scanners, processing of digital photographs has become the single greatest use of any image manipulation program. As a Linux user, I am using the GIMP as the primary tool for making basic adjustments to my photos. My usual workflow is as follows:

    1. remove dust etc. with clone tool
    2. rotate (if neccessary)
    3. crop
    4. levels
    5. color balance, contrast adjustment (if neccessary)
    6. unsharp mask

    The GIMP fails to provide the tools I require in cases 2, 4, 5 a
    • You can measure the angle between the actual horizontal and the line you want to be horizontal with the measuring tool and then rotate by this angle.

      Of course, photoshop handles this better by making the previously measured angle the default in the rotation tool when you bring it up.

      • Transformation preview (Score:5, Informative)

        by BigSven ( 57510 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @07:18AM (#10880201) Homepage
        Actually there's an easier way to correct for a misrotated image and it's in GIMP since version 1.2. The transform tools have a Corrective mode (available from the tool options). In that mode you rotate the grid so it aligns with the horizontal/vertical lines in your image and the tool will rotate the image in the other direction so that these lines become horizontal/vertical.

        GIMP 2.2 adds the often requested preview for transformations but actually Corrective mode is a lot more versatile and much easier to use especially when it comes to correcting perspective distortions.

        • EXACTLY. (Score:3, Insightful)

          by Ayanami Rei ( 621112 ) *
          ...but actually Corrective mode is a lot more versatile and much easier to use especially when it comes to correcting perspective distortions.

          You have no idea. This is (IMO) the one single, most useful feature of the GIMP.
          Arbitrary inverse linear transformations.

          That and quick editing of masks/alpha channels. I love being able to "paste down" grayscale right into the mask layer, or an arbitrary channel.
          Mix that with the "compose images" feature...
    • You shouldn't complain about lack of rotate preview in this article (hint, it's in there now).

      It's in the works. You might wan't to look into Cinepaint for now.

      Probably there, I'm at work now and can't check.

    • Re:Give us 16-bit color! (Score:4, Informative)

      by dimss ( 457848 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @07:45AM (#10880270) Homepage
      > This is very much a hassle, but I actually expect USM preview to be present in the GIMP 2.2.

      There is USM preview.

  • Oh no, they are using the new gtk file chooser. I really liked the old one, since you could quickly traverse through your directories via keyboard. I know that I can get a textbox to input the path via some key-combination, but I really liked the old open-file-fialog.

  • pretty much every single item listed in the changelist is going to make me a very, very happy gimper. Shortcut editing, improved copy/paste, new input controls, previews, improved cropping, ico files... It's going to be a very very nice package.

    For everyone whining about it not being as "good" as photoshop, quit bitching and go use photoshop. Gimp is not a photoshop clone. It is an independent application and stands just fine on its own merits.

  • Maybe dump GTK+ for wxWidgets? I'm sure it would be a large undertaking but surely the benefits of having native looking widgets and having a version for Mac and Windows that isn't half assed like GTK+ would be worth something?

    Am I the only one that thinks that GTK+ is just plain terrible outside of X?

    • I highly doubt such a thing could happen. An app like the GIMP is very UI-heavy. Rewriting it with another widget set would be a huge undertaking. It would make far more sense and take far less effort to simply improve GTK+ support for non X platforms.

      Also, I hope you are aware that GTK is short for GIMP ToolKit.

  • Animated GIF (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Writer ( 746272 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @07:45AM (#10880266)
    Anyone notice that the eyes on the GIMP icon [slashdot.org] move? That's the first time I noticed anything animated on slashdot other than the ads.

    • Re:Animated GIF (Score:3, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Anyone notice that the eyes on the GIMP icon [slashdot.org] move?

      This sounds really scary; are Slashdot logo's becoming self-aware? This place really gives me the creeps.

  • Still no non-destructive editing abilities (Score:5, Interesting)

    by t_allardyce ( 48447 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @08:04AM (#10880317) Journal
    I looked in the feature list but i couldnt find this feature, its been aching to be in there for years and its one of the only major reasons i dont use GIMP: Non-destructive filters, i.e being able to apply a filter and then later go back and edit the parameters of that filter or take it away, much like photoshops adjustment layers and effects panel. Theres no excuse for not putting this in because it could fit in the existing structure and filters. As my final year project im writing something similar to that idea but a kind of hybrid with connectable blocks. I really wish they would put this in, they could easily do it better than photoshop and make GIMP serious competition. If they already have someone let me know?
  • I'm using GIMP 2.0.5 for Windows, and my biggest complaint is that the JPEG importer can't handle eBay created (ones with the camera watermark in bottom right corner) JPEGs - it ALWAYS hangs (JPEGS from other sources are OK). I always have to use paint to convert eBay JPEGs to BMP to be able to load them into GIMP.
  • (I know it's been said, probably in every post above this, but..)
    To do this the Gimp needs to become nicer to use for the gimp newbs, I've used photoshop for ages, before that, I used Paint Shop Pro, the change from one to the tother wasn't painless, but it was still easy enough (ie. intuitive) to find out what I wanted to do.
    However, any time I've used the gimp I stop after hardly any time, almost nothing makes sense. Maybe that's an exagguration, but that's exactly how it feels.
    Of course people who

  • looks good (Score:3, Interesting)

    by zpok ( 604055 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @09:20AM (#10880505) Homepage
    Or I should say, it looks a whole lot better than before. A jump from Photoshop 4 to 5.

    Especially the many preview screens will make a big difference to average users.

    While I still have a Photoshop around (several years old) I won't go for the Gimp, there's no incentive, but it is slowly becoming a program you can actually reccommend to people on a budget...

    Yeah yeah, that sounds blasé... but I do like PSD's text tools, multiple undo's, actions and well, just about everything. It grows on you. Someone just starting could now get used to the Gimp and maybe feel lost in Photoshop? It's possible.

  • Top Reasons I hate Gimp (Score:3, Interesting)

    by grumbel ( 592662 ) <grumbel+slashdot@gmail.com> on Sunday November 21, 2004 @10:00AM (#10880629) Homepage
    * ugly user interface, no matter of WiW is the way to go or not, currently I have to dig around for my palette or brush dialogs far to many times they really MUST be dockable to the image window to make Gimp painless to use. People saying that the current way is 'right' are just bloody ignorant, this issue is really poping up every time gimp is mentioned somewhere, yet still the developers failed to address it properly in the last 5 years

    * lack of a proper fullscreen mode, while its there is quite limited in they way that one can scroll, dialog boxes cover the drawing area so that one constantly has to move stuff around, again proper docking to the image borders might help a lot

    * lack of advanced brushes, currently all of gimps brushes are quite primitive, just the bare basics and there is no way to write new-ones as plug-ins, making it hard to actually create new ones. That said it was been tried to implement new cool stuff, but it never made its way into the Gimp:

    http://www.levien.com/gimp/wetdream.html

    * lack of macro recorder, my 1996 version of Corel Photopaint had already a kick-ass macro recorder, making it a joy to create scripts, you just recorde a macro, do what you want, go into the script editor add a few parameters to it, add a GUI dialog and you have a nice script in basically no time, Gimp today is still stuck with only Script-Fu and friends which are both a pain to write and debug, no macrorecorder there at all

    * lack of power in the scripting, plug-ins and PDB interface lacks functions, there are a bunch of functions that are available in the GUI, but not available in the scripting, so that one has to manually build-them, making scripting even more a pain than it already is. The GUI should ideally be just a 'container' that connects scripts with each other, everything in the GUI should be available in the scripting and each part of Gimp should be modifiable via scripting/plug-ins, brushes, gui, whatever.

    * tablet support, while its there it is not really that good, double-clicking is almost impossible on the Gtk components, with a tablet the clicks end up at different positions, Gtk+ seems to lack the tolerance to still register it as doubleclick, might be a Gimp, Gtk+, Xfree86 issue or whatever, however its causing quite huge throuble in Gimp (if there is some fix/hack/patch for it I would like to know)

    * load/save dialog, these are really just the standard Gtk+ ones with a single thumbnail, however for a graphic application it would be quite usefull to have full thumbnail view of all images, like you get in Nautilus or any fileviewer

    * very bad suport indexed images, one doesn't need them all that often these days, but still sometimes one need them and then Gimp is just a pain in the ass, a decade old version of DeluxPaint was way better at handling them

    * no quick&easy way to create brushes, ie. I would like to use a layer click a 'to-brush' button and then paint with it, however thats more or less impossible todo today, I have to save the image as brush, tweak some parameters, then select it from the brush dialog, etc. cost by far to much time for an operation that should really be 'single-click', beside from that brush handling itself is quite a arkward, some brushes are resizable, some others not, while idealy all should be modifiable and it even shouldn't be that difficult to implement

    * developers seem to be quite hostile against any suggestions from the outside, both on IRC and on the mailing list, other people seem to have made similar experiences so its not just me, other OSS projects seem to be quite a bit more friendly to their users

    There are probally a lot of more issues I have forgotten, but well, that should be the more important ones. Last not least, yeah I know, many people will now say that its OSS so I have no f*** right to critic it and if I would like the features I should implement them myself and beside Gimp is of course doing everything right and I am the one that is just using it wrong (wondering how that can happen after 6 years of gimp usage...), but well, go start flame me now...

    • Re:Top Reasons I hate Gimp (Score:5, Insightful)

      by BigSven ( 57510 ) on Sunday November 21, 2004 @10:46AM (#10880878) Homepage
      Let me comment on some of your points:


      * load/save dialog, these are really just the standard Gtk+ ones with a single thumbnail, however for a graphic application it would be quite usefull to have full thumbnail view of all images, like you get in Nautilus or any fileviewer

      Why don't you use nautilus or any other fileviewer then? The point of the GIMP UI is to allow you to use it together with other apps. So why don't you just open images from nautilus or drag them onto the GIMP toolbox? In GIMP 2.2 you can also drag them to an already opened image or into the Layers dialog.

      It would be a terrible waste of time and efforts to duplicate the functionality of your favorite file browser if you can just use it with The GIMP.


      * no quick&easy way to create brushes, ie. I would like to use a layer click a 'to-brush' button and then paint with it, however thats more or less impossible todo today

      It is possible for a long time already by means of "Script-Fu->Selection->To Brush". Sure this isn't very intuitive and it is planned to improve this with the next version. Most of the framework that is needed to make this happen is in place already.


      * developers seem to be quite hostile against any suggestions from the outside, both on IRC and on the mailing list

      Look at your own posting. It is titled "Top Reasons I hate GIMP". Now do you seriously expect to get friendly response when you address volunteers in such a way? You get back what you throw at people.
      • ### Why don't you use nautilus or any other fileviewer then?

        I do most of the time, however having thumbnail for all files in the open/save dialog would still be extremly usefull. This functionallity might be good to have in the Gtk+ filedialog itself, however it wouldn't have been rocket-sience to implement it in Gimp already years ago.

        ### It is possible for a long time already by means of "Script-Fu->Selection->To Brush".

        I know, it however fills the brush dialog with junk which I then have to manu

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