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Maybe i'm an outlier, but with zero prior experience in image editing software, i've found GIMP UI much more approachable than Photoshop. With PS i felt that th

Maybe i'm an outlier, but with zero prior experience in image editing software, i've found GIMP UI much more approachable than Photoshop. With PS i felt that the UI was much more tailored to experts or at least to people that knew what they were doing, whereas with GIMP i found the UI to be more beginner-friendly and discoverable. So yeah, YMMV. What a shocker! :) > Downvote all you want--I know open source can't handle criticism, but I really don't understand why they don't try to make it usable. I'm intrigued by this. Do you genuinely think that the GIMP developers don't want or don't try to make it usable or to improve it as much as they can? What do you imagine? That they decide to spend their time contributing to a FOSS project and think "hey, today i'll try to make this thing that i love a bit more obscure and unusable!"? I'm genuinely curious. I seems totally bizarre to me to think that way :S

fvdessen 9y ago
> Do you genuinely think that the GIMP developers don't want or don't try to make it usable or to improve it as much as they can? Ten years ago they made a call to artists to find out what they could improve, then didn't like the feedback they got and told the artists they were wrong. I guess that's how they got such a user hostile reputation.
- jandrese 9y ago
  I think most of the feedback they got was "copy Photoshop's interface", but I have to agree with some of the other users in this thread that Photoshop's interface can be shockingly non-intuitive in places.
  - nkkollaw 9y ago
    There are 20 years of corporate-backed work behind Photoshop's UI. GIMP has nothing but to learn from it. There would be nothing negative about copying it outright.
    - jandrese 9y ago
      Yeah, but it's 20 years of Adobe, which is not a company that I highly respect. IMHO there is a good chunk of Photoshop's interface that is the way it is mostly for legacy reasons. Some random programmer thought the feature would be good in buried down in this dialog box off of a vaguely related menu option and it has lived their ever since.
      - nkkollaw 9y ago
        Adobe is a pretty great company I would think..? Regardless, I can actually scale objects easily by dragging in Photoshop, at least.
        jandrese 9y ago
        Adobe the company that seems incapable of keeping up with Apple's API toolkits? How long did it take for Photoshop to go Cocoa?
- prokoudine 9y ago
  "Ten years ago they made a call to artists to find out what they could improve, then didn't like the feedback they got and told the artists they were wrong." You won't be able to prove this claim, because you made that up :)
  - nkkollaw 9y ago
    Can you prove he made that up..?
    - prokoudine 9y ago
      Of course I can. We did two rounds of interviews with pro users, all done by UX/UI experts. Who then wrote a number of functional specs (see gui.gimp.org). We implemented all specs that were completed, some specs weren't completed, unfortunately, and there's always more work to do in that regard.
  - epidemian 9y ago
    Thanks. I was really disappointed about the replies to my message. Because just claiming that "yes, they do not care, it's a fact", doesn't make it a fact. No links provided. Nothing. (In case someone wonders what's the evidence for claiming that the GIMP devs do actually care about the project: the evidence is the release itself. People don't volunteer to working on FOSS software and not care about the software or its users ;) )
nkkollaw 9y ago
> I'm intrigued by this. Do you genuinely think that the GIMP developers don't want or don't try to make it usable or to improve it as much as they can Yes. They focus on features _they_ care about, not what users care about. The features announced in this release are good proof of that, but if you look in a comment below there's a first-hand experience of how GIMP's developers are annoyed by usability and the fact that users would want a more usable software. I far from think that GIMP's developers owe me or anyone else anything. I just think it's a shame that GIMP is recommended so often to people that just moved to Linux (or actually in general), because there are good programs--like Pinta for editing and Krita for drawing--that are at par with Photoshop and are totally usable without installing Photoshop or going back to Windows.
- prokoudine 9y ago
  "Yes. They focus on features _they_ care about, not what users care about. The features announced in this release are good proof of that" I feel almost sorry about wasting my time replying you, because you can't even read the first two paragraphs in the release notes. 2.10 rc1 is not about new fancy features, it's about fixing a shit ton of bugs and adding stuff that improves reporting bugs and making GIMP more stable and responsive. Try wrapping your head around that. "but if you look in a comment below there's a first-hand experience of how GIMP's developers are annoyed by usability and the fact that users would want a more usable software." It looks made up :) Edit: formatting
  - nkkollaw 9y ago
    > I feel almost sorry about wasting my time replying you, because you can't even read the first two paragraphs in the release notes. That's not very nice, uh? I don't think I offended anyone here. However, I don't have to wrap my head around anything, because my point is that I don't think GIMP's developer's priority are in line with its users. I have hardly seen anyone complain about GIMP's bugs and stability problems (actually on that front it's been working great since I remember), and lots of people installing Wine because they can't figure out the interface. > "but if you look in a comment below there's a first-hand experience of how GIMP's developers are annoyed by usability and the fact that users would want a more usable software." It looks made up :) Since you've gone around the thread saying everything people post is a lie, can you actually state facts since you love facts so much? Can you link to a conversation the devs had about usability, where they were saying that it's important to them, their users, and a priority for the project?
s73v3r_ 9y ago
"Do you genuinely think that the GIMP developers don't want or don't try to make it usable or to improve it as much as they can?" Their actions and statements really lead us to conclude as much, yes.
- prokoudine 9y ago
  "Their actions and statements really lead us to conclude as much, yes." Facts, please.

fvdessen 9y ago

> Do you genuinely think that the GIMP developers don't want or don't try to make it usable or to improve it as much as they can? Ten years ago they made a call to artists to find out what they could improve, then didn't like the feedback they got and told the artists they were wrong. I guess that's how they got such a user hostile reputation.

jandrese 9y ago
I think most of the feedback they got was "copy Photoshop's interface", but I have to agree with some of the other users in this thread that Photoshop's interface can be shockingly non-intuitive in places.
- nkkollaw 9y ago
  There are 20 years of corporate-backed work behind Photoshop's UI. GIMP has nothing but to learn from it. There would be nothing negative about copying it outright.
  - jandrese 9y ago
    Yeah, but it's 20 years of Adobe, which is not a company that I highly respect. IMHO there is a good chunk of Photoshop's interface that is the way it is mostly for legacy reasons. Some random programmer thought the feature would be good in buried down in this dialog box off of a vaguely related menu option and it has lived their ever since.
    - nkkollaw 9y ago
      Adobe is a pretty great company I would think..? Regardless, I can actually scale objects easily by dragging in Photoshop, at least.
      - jandrese 9y ago
        Adobe the company that seems incapable of keeping up with Apple's API toolkits? How long did it take for Photoshop to go Cocoa?
prokoudine 9y ago
"Ten years ago they made a call to artists to find out what they could improve, then didn't like the feedback they got and told the artists they were wrong." You won't be able to prove this claim, because you made that up :)
- nkkollaw 9y ago
  Can you prove he made that up..?
  - prokoudine 9y ago
    Of course I can. We did two rounds of interviews with pro users, all done by UX/UI experts. Who then wrote a number of functional specs (see gui.gimp.org). We implemented all specs that were completed, some specs weren't completed, unfortunately, and there's always more work to do in that regard.
- epidemian 9y ago
  Thanks. I was really disappointed about the replies to my message. Because just claiming that "yes, they do not care, it's a fact", doesn't make it a fact. No links provided. Nothing. (In case someone wonders what's the evidence for claiming that the GIMP devs do actually care about the project: the evidence is the release itself. People don't volunteer to working on FOSS software and not care about the software or its users ;) )

nkkollaw 9y ago

> I'm intrigued by this. Do you genuinely think that the GIMP developers don't want or don't try to make it usable or to improve it as much as they can Yes. They focus on features _they_ care about, not what users care about. The features announced in this release are good proof of that, but if you look in a comment below there's a first-hand experience of how GIMP's developers are annoyed by usability and the fact that users would want a more usable software. I far from think that GIMP's developers owe me or anyone else anything. I just think it's a shame that GIMP is recommended so often to people that just moved to Linux (or actually in general), because there are good programs--like Pinta for editing and Krita for drawing--that are at par with Photoshop and are totally usable without installing Photoshop or going back to Windows.

prokoudine 9y ago
"Yes. They focus on features _they_ care about, not what users care about. The features announced in this release are good proof of that" I feel almost sorry about wasting my time replying you, because you can't even read the first two paragraphs in the release notes. 2.10 rc1 is not about new fancy features, it's about fixing a shit ton of bugs and adding stuff that improves reporting bugs and making GIMP more stable and responsive. Try wrapping your head around that. "but if you look in a comment below there's a first-hand experience of how GIMP's developers are annoyed by usability and the fact that users would want a more usable software." It looks made up :) Edit: formatting
- nkkollaw 9y ago
  > I feel almost sorry about wasting my time replying you, because you can't even read the first two paragraphs in the release notes. That's not very nice, uh? I don't think I offended anyone here. However, I don't have to wrap my head around anything, because my point is that I don't think GIMP's developer's priority are in line with its users. I have hardly seen anyone complain about GIMP's bugs and stability problems (actually on that front it's been working great since I remember), and lots of people installing Wine because they can't figure out the interface. > "but if you look in a comment below there's a first-hand experience of how GIMP's developers are annoyed by usability and the fact that users would want a more usable software." It looks made up :) Since you've gone around the thread saying everything people post is a lie, can you actually state facts since you love facts so much? Can you link to a conversation the devs had about usability, where they were saying that it's important to them, their users, and a priority for the project?

s73v3r_ 9y ago

"Do you genuinely think that the GIMP developers don't want or don't try to make it usable or to improve it as much as they can?" Their actions and statements really lead us to conclude as much, yes.

prokoudine 9y ago
"Their actions and statements really lead us to conclude as much, yes." Facts, please.