GIMP 2.8 released
Linked by Thom Holwerda on Thu 3rd May 2012 22:36 UTC
Graphics, User Interfaces It's here: the GIMP 2.8. Its biggest feature is something that many, many people have been requesting for as long as I can remember: single-window mode. No longer do you have to fiddle with a gazillion palette and dialog windows (unless you choose to do so, of course). Great work by the team.
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RE[4]: Comment
by pandronic on Sat 5th May 2012 13:58 UTC in reply to "RE[3]: Comment"
pandronic
Member since:
2006-05-18

Back with the reply ...

I'm not arguing that Photoshop is the end-all, be-all standard in UI design for graphic editing programs, but after 12 (?) versions I think they've developed their paradigm almost to perfection. That doesn't mean that someone else can't come up with a competing paradigm that can be as good or even better. And I don't think the GIMP guys have got that alternative. It's basically the same old stuff ... document windows and a bunch of palettes, just implemented worse.

using tiny icons that are a pain to target with a pen tablet.


Funny, I've got a graphical tablet here (not the kind with a LCD in it), and I have no trouble to hit any icons. But I appreciate the extra space I have for my document. A pen is as good as a mouse is to hit targets. It's not like a finger where you can press any of 50x50 pixels.

I'm just as happy as you to see single-windows mode coming to GIMP, but that comment does have some irony to it coming from a Pixelmator user, isn't it ?


I'm only a casual Pixelmator user (now that I've got rid of my Mac, maybe I won't be a Pixelmator user at all). As I've said in another post, I appreciate their vision, but I disagree with some design decisions - one of which is the fact that their palettes don't snap together or to the edge of the screen. But, the difference is that in Pixelmator there's also a lot to like. They didn't have the courage to depart completely from the old palettes, but they put some nice twists here and there on the old paradigm.

And those alleged huge holes in GIMP's feature set will never, ever be mentioned again.


Again, I said in another post I didn't want to criticize the feature set of GIMP, because I haven't tested v2.8 and only briefly tested other versions. But, this application is 16 years old and just now they've implemented layer groups and on-canvas text-editing ... need I say more?

Lots of subjective adjectives, but not so much meat here. The only issue that is precise enough that you could turn it into a bug report is that the UI does not scale well when window width is reduced.


http://i.imgur.com/IoaGW.png

Source: official 2.8 screenshot

And... That's another fail. Why you like to quickly dismiss GIMP's UI as something made by developers with no taste, please take some time to learn about Herr Peter Sikking, who's been working on GIMP's UI for... say... years ? ;) http://blog.mmiworks.net/


Either the guy is incompetent, the devs don't take him seriously, or he's half way through his work. Either way my point about the UI stands. Maybe in a few versions his work will start to show, who knows?

Oh, really ? Just put professional Cubase and Logic users together in a room and give each group the task to convince the other group to use "their" software. I promise I'll help with cleaning up the blood.


Please do no compare Photoshop to GIMP. It's like comparing an Audi to a Hyundai. Try comparing Paint.net & GIMP and we'll have a discussion.

The more effort you've spend into something, the harder it is to switch to something else. Especially when that something is an income source, and when productivity losses caused by learning a new software directly lead to professional issues.


Very true, but then again you have to have comparable products. I don't know much about audio software so maybe Cubase and Logic are both as good but in different ways, but please do not insult Photoshop with such a comparison. Switching is not hard if the products are equally competent but different. This is not the case.

You just state more directly than before that what you want is a free clone of photoshop.


Yes I do, because the GIMP people don't seem capable of developing a competing UI paradigm, so I assumed that they're better of copying something that works.

And in the end, you're rambling imprecisely on an obscure website about OSs and patents, which is not likely to help in any way. Ever heard of bug reports and mailing lists ?


I'm doing this because I don't want the typical open-source responses - if you don't like it fork it, contribute, or file bug reports.

I don't want to do that. My hobbies don't include contributing to open-source projects. Since they put it out for the public, I just want to use it and if I think it's bad, I want to be able to say it's bad and be done with it. It's equal to me if a piece of software is open-source, freeware or priced within my budget. I'll pick the best, while not giving a crap about politics and licenses.

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