Martin Nordholts writes:
> I've have experience with both of Photoshop and GIMP, and I don't agree. To
> me Photoshop's interface is much more thoroughly designed.
Well, using usability expertise and the experience of real power GIMP
users in (re)designing GIMP's UI is something which the GIMP
developers are actively doing now. But as Sven said, the point is not
to make GIMP look like Photoshop.
> At first I had a hard time grasping the philosify behind
> Photoshop's interface, but after taking a class where we learned
> PS, it all made sense.
The same approach would work as well for GIMP, too.
> Well, I think it should! If there is any software today that has
> potential to be a PS counterpart, it is GIMP. I mean why, would we
> not want it to be Photoshop?
Why would we want it to be Photoshop?
That would be silly. It will take years for GIMP to have the same
features as Photoshop has now, and by then, Photoshop will have
evolved again ;) This is just a fact that I assume most fellow GIMP
developers realize. GIMP developers are not motivated by making PS
users switch. Most of the (actually quite few) GIMP developers work on
GIMP because they love to program. Not because GIMP wants increased
market share.
> It would be more logical to have a separate toolbox, and a separate 'GIMP
> window'. The GIMP window would be a container for toolbox window, the layer
> window etc (á la PS).
No, having a big GIMP window with the image and tool dialogs inside it
is definitely something that the developers don't want to implement
(themselves).
However, the way free software works is that if somebody wants a
feature hard enough, they write a patch that is clean and implements
the feature, and submit that to the maintainers. (Or alternatively,
they convince (perhaps through funding) somebody, like their Linux
distro company, to write the feature.)
The writer of such a patch should also be prepared to maintain her
code for at least some years. It's not nice to just dump a bunch of
code on people who are kind enough to accept it even if they don't
really like the features it provides, and leave.
I assume GIMP maintainers would gladly accept such a patch as long as
it was well-written and clean. That would at least make a part of the
users happier.
("Clean" meaning here that it doesn't unnecessaily stomp on other
parts of the code, uses the same coding style as the rest of the code,
and doesn't break anything else.)
It would have been much more productive if the author of the "GIMP
deweirdifyer", for instance, would have cooperated with GIMP
developers and searched for ways to have that code in the official
GIMP sources instead of as a freestanding separately distributed tool.
> If you don't take the time to understand that interface, it will
> feel unlogical (I had the same feeling) and it can easily be
> dismissed as 'badly designed'. Once you know it though, the
> workflow is absolutley brilliant.
This can be said about GIMP, too. Watching an experienced GIMP user
work can be a revelation. The GIMP workflow looks absolutely brilliant
then, too.
--tml
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