Here is my contribution to the GIMP 2.6 roadmap: a description of theremaining tasks related to the metadata viewer/editor and someenhancements for the jpeg plug-in (and other plug-ins). In the following list, the tasks marked with a "+" are the ones that Iwould like to include in 2.6, while the tasks marked with a "-" willbe postponed until after 2.6. These optional tasks are listed here forcompleteness and they could still be included in case there is asudden rush of volunteers willing to contribute to these improvements.;-) * metadata core (stuff that does not need a user interface): + migrate some parts of the metadata core to a library that can be used by the main app. as well as some plug-ins + clean up the PDB interface + convert EXIF to XMP + convert XMP to EXIF - convert IPTC to XMP (IPTC Core for XMP) - convert XMP to IPTC - rewrite the XMP parser and the internal data model * metadata viewer/editor (user interface) + implement the "user-friendly" tabs in the metadata editor - make the tabs configurable, similar to Adobe's XMP panels - easy merging of XMP presets from a drop-down list or something similar (e.g. to apply a Creative Commons license or to set a group of properties such as creator, publisher, etc.) - allow the creation of such XMP presets - warn the user if the metadata states that editing the image is not allowed (XMP Rights Management) - implement history tracking for XMP Media Management - allow creative editing of the embedded thumbnail * jpeg plug-in + simplify the user interface: the default view should show only a selection between a few options (e.g, "high/medium/low" or 0-12 like in Photoshop) combining both quality and subsampling; move the old 0-100 "quality" slider inside the advanced options + remove the prompt for EXIF orientation: it should always be done - allow lossless or nearly lossless saves if only a few changes have been applied to the original image (e.g. 90 degrees rotation or minor edits in a limited area) * all file plug-ins + handle metadata correctly (at least for jpeg, tiff, png) + make sure that the last used settings are saved in a parasite attached to the image instead of using global "save_vals", etc. - make it easy to save and restore settings (more than one set) in case the user wants to apply the same settings to several images In case the description or purpose of some of these items is notclear, here are some additional comments: The metadata editor uses XMP internally, because XMP is a superset ofEXIF, IPTC and other metadata standards (or de facto standards). TheXMP parser and generator are already included in GIMP 2.4. I alsowrote some code to convert from/to EXIF, but I did not finish it and Ithink that it is better to rewrite it from scratch anyway. Theproblem with EXIF is that although the basic features are easy toparse, there are dozens of special cases and broken implementations totake care of, especially for the handling of MakerNotes. As we discussed already several months ago, it would be useful to movesome parts of the metadata handling code into a library that can beused directly by other plug-ins or by the gimp core, instead ofinvoking the metadata plug-in as in 2.4. It should be possible forthe user to keep the "Image Properties" window open at all times andto see the changes in real-time (resolution, size, comment, etc.). Inorder to allow these real-time updates, the code displaying this partof the image metadata should be part of the gimp core. This does notmean that all metadata handling should be done in the core: it wouldalso be possible to have only the "viewer" part and the basic metadatahandling in the core but keep the "editor" part as an externalplug-in. Another option would be to keep all that out of the core butchange the plug-in API so that it allows a plug-in to remain attachedto an image while other plug-ins are running, and change the protocolso that it allows a plug-in to get real-time updates about whathappens to the image. Regarding the user interface and the options (probably post-2.6) tomake tabs configurable or to choose XMP presets from a list, I thinkthat it is easier to understand if you look at these images: http://www.creativecommons.org/images/metadata/xmp-adobe-panel.png http://www.creativecommons.org/images/metadata/xmp-cc-panel.png http://www.creativecommons.org/images/metadata/xmp-multiple.jpgNote that in these images, the "Creative Commons" panel is anextension that can be downloaded from the CC site (it's a simple XMLfile) and it shows up among the other XMP panels, with the appropriatewidgets for editing specific parts of the XMP metadata. See also:http://wiki.creativecommons.org/XMP_Help There are also some improvements for the JPEG plug-in. As I mentionedsome time ago, I would like to hide the current "quality" slider amongthe advanced options, and replace it by a smaller selection ofpre-defined quality levels. I have also thought about some nicetricks that would allow almost lossless re-saving of JPEG images, butI am not sure that I would have time to work on that in the 2.6timeframe. -Raphaël_______________________________________________Gimp-developer mailing listGimp-developer@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx://lists.XCF.Berkeley.EDU/mailman/listinfo/gimp-developer
