The GIMP Now Has a Working Single-Window Mode 403
An anonymous reader writes "Phoronix is reporting that The GIMP now has a working single-window mode, a long desired feature by the open-source graphics community to be more competitive with Adobe Photoshop. There's also a number of other user highlights in the new GIMP 2.7.3 release. The GPLv3 graphics software can be downloaded at GIMP.org."
Re:Don't they do this every couple of years? (Score:4, Informative)
No they don't do this every couple of years.
But the main reason Photoshop people don't switch is that Photoshop isn't all that expensive if you use it every day. GIMP also does not have 16-bit color or CMYK.
That's development release (Score:5, Informative)
Use it with care, as it is development release with rather large rewrites and therefore not suitable for production use. For this release I honestly don't care about single window mode as I'm not Windows drone - GEGL improvements and usage, new text entry mode, and lot of other small improvements interests me more.
Official release in fall/spring (as far as I understood).
Re:to be competitive (Score:5, Informative)
Re:YES! (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Don't they do this every couple of years? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Don't they do this every couple of years? (Score:3, Informative)
Last time I attempted to use it, the simple fact you couldn't see the brush when you moved the mouse over the canvas infuriated me to the point I doubt I'll bother with it again.
This seems like a totally different issue from the single-window mode thing, and I don't see how any GIMP user would complain about this being implemented.
The GUI was hideous. If there is development work going on in this area, then IMHO it should be applauded. Taking your approach of simply poo-pooing everything because you absurdly believe GUI enhancements to be the work of satan (photoshop users), isn't really going to move the product forward now is it?
Going to a single-window mode isn't an enhancement, it's a regression. The GIMP's UI is superior for Unix-like systems, especially if they have multiple monitors, and allows the window manager to manage the individual windows rather than reimplementing a separate window manager inside the application. MDI is an abomination from the Windows world, and is only there to make up for the terrible window manager that Windows uses.
Re:Don't they do this every couple of years? (Score:4, Informative)
I forgive your ignorance, but I feel compelled to respond here by saying that it's actually the other way around. Photoshop has an awesome recording/playback capability (called Actions). You just hit record, perform the steps you desire, hit stop and there you go.
With the GIMP the nearest equivalent are scripts, but you have to write them yourself using a pseudo-scripting language. There's no simple recording feature, and I wasn't going to sit and waste time learn how to code up a script for an equivalent workflow of what I was used to doing in Photoshop, because the scripting is actually very complicated, particularly if you can't find the commands to do what you want.
People have complained about this (from 2001! - https://bugzilla.gnome.org/show_bug.cgi?id=51937 [gnome.org]), but nothing has happened because as the last post in said thread says, "we simply don't have
enough developers."
I won't bug them about it, but I won't bother with GIMP anymore because it simply lacks easy of use and important functionality. Open source doesn't always work in practice.