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Graphics Software The Gimp

Gimp 2.0 Pre 2 Released 67

Posted by timothy from the slicker-than-teflon dept.
Paul Kucher writes "A second preview of GIMP 2.0 has been released. From gimp.org: "Lots of bugs have been fixed since the last release and you are encouraged to try the new pre-release. It is now available from ftp.gimp.org or from one of the mirrors. Plug-in authors, please consider to port your GIMP plug-in to the 2.0 API. Now is a good time to do that." I have posted some screenshots here."
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Gimp 2.0 Pre 2 Released More

Gimp 2.0 Pre 2 Released

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  • . . . to start using it again? I tried it out in 2000 and it was painfull. has it matured to a good point yet?

    • Re:Is it time.. . . (Score:5, Insightful)

      by BlueEar ( 550461 ) on Monday January 19, 2004 @07:48PM (#8027029) Homepage

      My overall impression is that GIMP has been designed by highly qualified geeks, but geeks nevertheless. I think it would benefit immensly from a usability expert input. A number of solutions chosen is far from intuitive. While the overall capabilities of GIMP are excellent, it takes some getting-used-to time. Once the initial "who the hell thought that right click plus Ctrl is a natural solution for this operation" types of experiences are over, you might be pleasantly surprised by the power of GIMP. Overall, this is one software that I woulde definitely recomment reading books [gimp-savvy.com] or tutorials [gimp.org] before using it. Ah, and yes, I find that 1.3 series and now 2.0 release candidates have some improvements in usability over 1.2 version. Dockable dialogs and a much better menu systems just to name a few ...

  • What I don't like about the Gimp (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ObviousGuy ( 578567 ) <ObviousGuy@hotmail.com> on Monday January 19, 2004 @07:29PM (#8026791) Homepage Journal
    Why don't they use a master window to contain all the other child Gimp windows? Every window floats free and disappears and reappears as application focus changes.

    Taking a clue from Photoshop, the Gimp could be made much more user-friendly just by adding a simple window frame around all the controls and sub-windowing all the other windows.

    • Re:What I don't like about the Gimp (Score:4, Interesting)

      by SchnauzerGuy ( 647948 ) on Monday January 19, 2004 @07:38PM (#8026910)
      Maybe it is a (bad) design decision, or perhaps it is related to this: Adobe Sues Over Tabbed Widgets [slashdot.org]

    • Re:What I don't like about the Gimp (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward
      It's called MDI [microsoft.com]

      Some people love it. I hate it. I think it sorta breaks the normal flow of work. Suddenly it's much harder to switch back and forth between a GIMP window and an xterm because your gimp window has to be full screen to hold all the palletes.

      But, you know, it's a personal preference thing. Maybe it would be nice if they could make it an option.
      • I can see what you're getting at, but I usually switch from one app to another using keyboard shortcuts rather than hunting and clicking with the mouse. For me, the removal of the master window doesn't buy any benefits, but actually incurs a small penalty.

        Making it an option would definitely be nice. Different strokes and all that.

    • Re:What I don't like about the Gimp (Score:5, Informative)

      by caseih ( 160668 ) on Monday January 19, 2004 @07:50PM (#8027057)
      This is in part a design decision, and partly due to the traditional nature of the gtk widget set. Essentially there is no MDI in gtk, for good or bad. Part of the solution to address this multiple window out-of-control problem is the dock idea that they've come up with. I configure gimp to just have one window (the default is 2, but you can easily rearrange it into one) that has the tool palette and all the other things I need docked to it. It's very dynamic and customizable. Sections can be added, tabs added, etc. That one window is always on top. Then my picture windows float next to it. That way I get the best of both worlds. I don't need another application to take over my entire screen like photoshop does. I prefer the windows. Except for the fact that the dock thing can only be vertical (having it horzonal at times would be nice), I think this is superior to the photoshop-style ui.

      Besides that, I've always maintained that anyone who runs apps full screen (which you pretty much have to with MDI apps) really isn't using a windowing system to their best advantage. MDI is rapidly falling out of favor. MS no longer uses it for many applications and MacOS never ever did. Tabs work well for most things, although images are better off in windows. Anyway, the interface on gimp is light years ahead of the old interface! Now if only glade could get a similar interface makeover.
      • Essentially there is no MDI in gtk, for good or bad.

        While that's true, GTK was created to serve GIMP. If they wanted MDI, they could have added it. I think the "no-MDI" thing was a conscious decision and not a toolkit limitation.

      • Re:What I don't like about the Gimp (Score:3, Insightful)

        by Anonymous Coward

        I've always maintained that anyone who runs apps full screen really isn't using a windowing system to their best advantage.

        I have to disagree here. Perhaps if you have some insanely large desktop it's worth it, but at 1024x768, there simply isn't enough room to have more than one productively sized window for most applications. All you end up doing is wasting the edges of the screen real-estate and cluttering the "background". Grabbing and resizing an image window in the GIMP is noticably slower for

    • This is just what I like about the gimp.I dislike to be framed in on the desktop, especially when working simultaneously with different programs. This software is absolutely fantastic. I prefer it over photoshop. Especially the fast startup time (maybe thanks to the lack of unnecessary clutter with additional frames...).
    • > Taking a clue from Photoshop, the Gimp could be made much more user-friendly just by adding a simple window frame around all the controls and sub-windowing all the other windows.

      And that's almost exactly why I *like* the Gimp. I let my (carefully chosen to suit my needs) window manager deal with organising them.

      Apps that put everything in one parent window really bug me since I have to organise *those* windows seperately from all the other apps I have running. And I can't see my other windows when I

    • Re:What I don't like about the Gimp (Score:1, Interesting)

      by Anonymous Coward
      I agree, this should be an _option_ for people who like this kind of application interface.

      It makes sense for simple image editing requrements (a few pictures and menu's open).
      I also dislike having those GIMP pop-up menus float around/dissapear/etc.

      This is a MUCH reqeusted & debated feature, which simple should have been an option long ago IMHO.

      Lets hope someone will set this up for the next release.

      Thanks to the developers og The GIMP. Its a great free software bitmap graphics tool.

      John Kesta
    • Taking a clue from Photoshop, the Gimp could be made much more user-friendly just by adding a simple window frame around all the controls and sub-windowing all the other windows.

      This only happens in Windows. In the Mac version of Photoshop (actually, every single Mac application that follows the UI guidelines) there is no MDI like most Windows apps.

      I do feel that they should somehow reduce the number of entries that it creates in the Gnome or KDE taskbar.
      • My KDE 3.1.2 panel manages to group together all of the gimp windows, i'm pretty sure the latest gnome-panel is capable of that as well. sure, after you click on the single "gimp" icon, you then have to make another click to pick a gimp window--but one could imagine a window manager that remember which gimp window had focus last and then chose that one. Infact, since the window managers are already capable of grouping together single windows, it seems like it would be possible for the window manager to tu
      • The trick is on the Mac, even in OS 9, an open application gets only one entry in the task-list. Whether this is the application menu (mutli-finder) or the dock, photoshop appears once.

        What bothers me is that every window the gimp opens takes up a new task bar location. On the Mac, it's up the application to manage it's own open windows (That's what the "window" menu is for) and many OS X apps now adhere to the cmd-~ windows-in-current-application switch key, so I cycle though my open iChat windows, or m
    • The Gimp people seem like they have gone out of their way to do things differently then Photoshop. But the lack of a master window is one thing that paticularly pisses me off too.
    • Actually I would love if every application behaved this way. I fail to see any intuitive reason why you should mix canvs and the tools to modify it.

      The whole concept of "applications" is flawed. Wouldn't it be better if the DE (or WM) provieded the canvas and a standadized api/protocoll to modify its contents.
      Then you would just fire up the toolbox you would need for the task at hand.
    • You don't use multiple monitors, do you?
    • >Why don't they use a master window to contain all the other child Gimp windows?

      Ack! That would be *horrible*. You'd be forced to maximize that big parent
      window, in order to have enough space to spread out all your various Gimp
      (sub)windows, but then it would block out everything behind; you could not,
      for example, leave a gnome-terminal window showing through behind below your
      image, so that you'd notice when your download/compile/whatever completed.

      Please, don't force us into an opaque rectangle. The
      • > The only conceivable justification would be, "Well, Photoshop does it

        And, come to think of it, Photoshop *doesn't* -- at least, Photoshop 6.5
        for the Mac doesn't. It treats each image, toolbox, dialog box, or whatever
        as a separate toplevel window, just like Gimp does.

    • Virtual desktops (Score:3, Informative)

      by myzz ( 690332 )
      The is no need for MDI, when you have virtual desktops - the virtual desktop itself is the one big window, where the Gimp windows will sit. The virtual desktop solution is also more flexible - you may put some other apps windows to the same desktop as Gimp ones, when you find it useful and the Window Manager can be configured to behave as you like. Only on Windows it is useful to have one big maximized window with small ones inside it, since it doesn't have the virtual desktops.
    • Maybe they don't want to do everything like Photoshop.
      Maybe if they did people here would complain that "open source needs to innovate, not copy existing software"?
    • Actually ... the free floating window way GIMP operates is identical the the way Photoshop works on the Macintosh ... which has *always* been Photoshops native platform. One of the largest complaints I've heard from other Designers who've been forced to work on a PC at a new job vs a Mac is the the single containing window paradigm is a huge pain in the ass, and it makes it hard to use the desktop.
    • Why don't they use a master window to contain all the other child Gimp windows?

      Because that's an ugly and unfriendly thing to do. Let my window manager manage windows the way I want it to, please.

      (If I'm doing a lot of GIMPing I'll put it on its own virtual desktop. But I might to float those GIMP windows around a web browser window to see how that image looks in the web page I'm working on.)

  • ...or the page [gimp.org] hasn't been updated since 1.25.

    For the record, I know other posters have flamed GIMP for usability, but I find it adaquate for my occasional (perhaps once a month) phot manipulation needs.

  • i been all over this intarweb and caint find no win32
    builds..they didnt abandon us geeks with windoze girlfriends did they ?

  • Two editing styles (Score:4, Insightful)

    by digitect ( 217483 ) <digitect @ d a n c i n g p a per.com> on Tuesday January 20, 2004 @01:21AM (#8029185)

    As I sit here reading comments, I'm struck by the two conflicting desires of the posters:

    1. MDI v. window manager
    2. Window mouse-clicking/virtual workspace-swapping v. Alt+Tab/Window list mouse-clicking

    Perhaps we're using GIMP two different ways.

    It appears those that do not want MDI want to be able to arrange their windows around the desktop leaving little areas to peer through to other apps in the background. This group likes to use the mouse to focus windows and may enjoy being able to swap to another workspace to preserve this environment.

    Others of us (myself included) sometimes do graphics professionally for days straight at a time. We're in the environment 10-12 hours and may have 20-50 image windows open in one session, maybe 500 a day. (Such as when producing icons, or bullets, or thumbnails, etc.) In this case, having to select objects by visual means is almost impossible. There are enough windows to completely obstruct the background with frames alone. And who on earth would actually go to the trouble to physically arrange them all?! Instead, we prefer a single Alt+Tab or mouse click on the window list to switch away, and another to return to the graphic application environment. The MDI has it's own window list which aids in having to decide between different names and other applications in the same list. It also has its own separate Ctrl+Tab key combination to page between them.

    I guess I'm tired of seeing the flames. Can't the developers simply acknowldege that there is more than one way to look at the UI and add the simple option to have MDI? Or is it really not that simple? Perhaps not. Is that why the option is being avoided?

    • Re:Two editing styles (Score:4, Informative)

      by IamTheRealMike ( 537420 ) * on Tuesday January 20, 2004 @08:54AM (#8031091)
      I guess I'm tired of seeing the flames. Can't the developers simply acknowldege that there is more than one way to look at the UI and add the simple option to have MDI? Or is it really not that simple? Perhaps not. Is that why the option is being avoided?

      Your problem is solved by virtual desktops. MDI is not supported by most windowing systems that Gimp is run on (X, Quartz) .. in fact only Win32 does support it. MDI is a hack that doesn't allow you to use standard windowing widgets like the window list to switch between them. It's hard to implement. It's a limitless source of bugs. It's got terrible usability - even Microsoft doesn't use it anymore.

      In short, if you want to have many windows open at once and manage them all, use virtual desktops - use many of them, if you like. Have each image you are working with on a different desktop. I've done this and found it works nicely, much better than MDI ever did.

    • In Gimp's defense it's meant to run under X. So a busy person like you could use virtual desktops, each with it's own resoultion and window lists, to switch between apps/app families with a single keystroke!!! learning to use Linux virtual desktops takes some getting used to from being a Windows drone, but it's quite cool...
    • It appears those that do not want MDI want to be able to arrange their windows around the desktop leaving little areas to peer through to other apps in the background. This group likes to use the mouse to focus windows and may enjoy being able to swap to another workspace to preserve this environment.

      MDI and virtual workspaces are basically the same idea -- group together related windows. The difference: in MDI, the groupings follow vendor/application lines. In virtual workspaces, the user groups windows
  • The GIMP just keeps getting better and better. I think this is great for open source, and for the thousands of people who need a really good graphics tool but don't want to chuck out the money for Photoshop.

    But to head all the photoshop comparisons off at the pass...Don't assume that most people who already use photoshop even care. They've got a time and education investment. Their tool is literally 100% supported in their profession. It does almost everything they need, and has near perfect interoperabili
    • I think it did have tilt and pressure sensitivity, but I do not recall exactly. I know it wasn't included in the windows variant.

      You might try looking here [sunsite.dk] for configuration help, and perhaps tldp.org [tldp.org]
    • > as a side note, does anyone use GIMP with a Wacom pad in Xfree86?

      yes. :)

      > Do all the basic tools and plugins take advantage of tilt and pressure?

      Yes - but as my cheapo wacom is only presure sersitive - i cannot comment on the tilt.
    • is probably one of the main reasons why the GIMP will be successfull. Many vendors ship photo editors with their cameras. Of course, they are windows only and rather limited in functionality. More and more people are therefore looking for alternatives. For this, the GIMP works well.

      It isn't about to swat Photoshop, but it will come from behind. As open source, it is intrinsically more versatile and will end up overtaking Photoshop. Eventually.

    • Wacom support (Score:2, Informative)

      by djeca ( 670911 )

      If X supports your pad, the Gimp supports it.

      I've had great success (for my needs) with a Wacom PenPartner (well, until it broke and turned into an expensive mousepad :() and all the Gimp tools recognise tilt and pressure where appropriate.

    • (as a side note, does anyone use GIMP with a Wacom pad in Xfree86? Do all the basic tools and plugins take advantage of tilt and pressure? I can't find any user experiences with this on the net, and I'd like to know before I recompile X for pad support, and actually dig the thing out of the attic.)

      I sure do. My Graphire3 XL works absolutely fine using the wacom driver in the kernel (modded a bit to support the graphire3) and the wacom Xinput driver from the linuxwacom project.
  • MacGIMP [macgimp.org].

    They have a pre2 release candidate already as well...

  • Fact 1) I've been using Photoshop since version 3, or for about eight years. It took at least five years for me to consider myself a 'master' of it, and yet I still learn tricks from people. So, I love Photoshop. It's really a rock.

    Fact 2) I used Gimp a couple of years ago, and hated it.

    Now forward to the present day.. these screenshots look EXCELLENT. Finally it looks like we're going places. The open source thing is paying off, and I can see some regular designers using this stuff in a year or two. Unre
    • you can add applets (system monitor, gnome-pilot, volume control, clock, etc...), as well as quick-launch buttons to the top toolbar. Besides, it doesn't really take up much space, and you can always just delete it and move the menus to the bottom bar.
  • I don't think GIMP will be taken sreiously until this major show stopping bug is fixed. Is anybody in Windows using the GIMP able to scan an image directly in the GIMP? if so, please give me a holler at davis UNDERSCORE family UNDERSCORE 46168 AT yahoo DOT com (please don't laugh about it being a yahoo address, at least I'm smart enough to not pay for it.) Thanks, as they do say, in advance. --- Rebel without a clue

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