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> > Photoshop. Illustrator. Why are these the first applications used for image editing and creation? > Because they're bloody good (well, Photoshop is). And G

> > Photoshop. Illustrator. Why are these the first applications used for image editing and creation? > Because they're bloody good (well, Photoshop is). And Gimp isn't. Imagine you're teaching people carpentry. There is a really nice automatic screw gun that accepts a cartridge of screws all lined up automatically so each one loads in place after the last one. It is super easy to use and people can get straight to fastening beams together. But the device is very expensive, and they cannot be repaired if they break, and the screw cartridges require a monthly plan where they will send you screws even if you still have plenty from last month, with a chip to make sure the screws won't feed from last month. Now compared to a boring battery operated drill, where the user has to gasp place each screw on the drill bit by hand, these fancy automatic screw feeding drills seem WAY BETTER! Surely the person can make better buildings with the fancy screw gun right? And we want them to make the best buildings possible right? Well the boring drill has user serviceable parts. Everything can be removed and replaced if needed. There are no control chips to stop it working. You don't have to pay every month for anything. And placing each screw on the bit by hand is fine, it's what everyone did ten years ago and those buildings are all still standing. Heck you're standing in one of those buildings right now! So maybe we should teach the students how to use tools that work without all this extra cost and nonsense. It's really a minor difference, since the point isn't to use the fanciest possible tool, but to teach them how to build buildings in a way that they can always take with them everywhere they go. And after they graduate school, they're not going to want to pay every month for one of those fancy drills!

germinalphrase 4y ago
Your example is only apt when using the tool is the point of the learning. More realistically, the drill is supposed to be an entirely necessary but incidental aspect of the learning. In this scenario, any amount of time or effort expended on problem solve the drill is taking time away from the primary learning objective. This is why teachers use Word and Google Docs. They do not give a shit about the tool. The tool is a means to an end. Word and Docs are familiar. Word and Docs work.
bombcar 4y ago
This basically exists for drywall: https://www.milwaukeetool.com/Products/Power-Tools/Fastening/Screw-Guns/49-20-0001 https://www.milwaukeetool.com/Products/Power-Tools/Fastening... And it’s a different skill set for sure, but highly worth it - someone who knows how do use it can hang drywall by themselves pretty easily. If that’s your job, you should definitely know how to use it (and how to use just the gun, and the simple drill).
nonrandomstring 4y ago
"Principles not products". That's what I call it. I've always taught that way and my students love it. At least the ones smart enough to realise they're being given a proper ground up education. We do every step the hard way, breaking it down with a historical context, a rationale and exposure to several different basic tools that do that fundamental job. They get to see the continuum between logic and arithmetic operators and a full application stack. Right at the end I let them loose on full-blown commercial toys - and they love that too, because they can now see the value those polished applications add. They can also see what is just cosmetic fluff and marketing patter. It's only the weaker students who are quick to "demand the latest shiny industry standard gizmos... because, like, jobs". And of course the management twonks who've been blinded by vendor lobbying and kickbacks. Truth is, modern software is so slick any fool can grab a ready-made plugin-o-matic that thinks for you and wipes your arse, but without understanding principles the moment they change the GUI you're completely lost.
TheOtherHobbes 4y ago
That's a terrible analogy for the differences between Photoshop and Gimp. For one thing Photoshop is a transferrable skill. Gimp will get you laughed out the door of most photo studios and design agencies. For another - too many FOSS people just do not understand that tinkering with tools is not the point for most users. If you like tinkering with tools, go tinker with tools. Most people have work to do, and tinkering with tools is not something they want to be distracted by. Photoshop is far from being my favourite product, and Adobe are very far from being my favourite company. In fact I - and millions of other users - would be delighted if we could save $$$$ a year with a free alternative. Which applies in the general case. If FOSS was a realistic and workable alternative, it would storm the market and most people would be using it. But it isn't. Most FOSS applications are aimed at self-selecting technical users, and there's very limited interest in making tools for non-technical users. In fact IMO FOSS culture lacks the mindset and skills - and very possibly the empathy - to understand what general users want from their tools. It's been a success for developers who want to make technical tools for other developers. And also for infrastructure. Not to take anything from that, because that's both significant and true. But for popular non-expert applications? Simply - no.
- KronisLV 4y ago
  > For one thing Photoshop is a transferable skill. Gimp will get you laughed out the door of most photo studios and design agencies. This is pretty much a self-perpetuating cycle and what happens when you have something close to a monopoly. Everyone uses Photoshop, almost nobody uses GIMP. Everyone uses Chrome, almost nobody uses Firefox. Everyone uses Windows, almost nobody uses Linux and so on... Thankfully, in the server space, *nix reigns supreme and FOSS has a larger foothold, though thanks to the above, the "year of the Linux desktop" may as well never come. > Most FOSS applications are aimed at self-selecting technical users, and there's very limited interest in making tools for non-technical users. In fact IMO FOSS culture lacks the mindset and skills - and very possibly the empathy - to understand what general users want from their tools. I'd say that it's also a matter of prioritizing what's necessary to get things done and simply not having the resources for the rest: UX, marketing, branding, integrations and so on.
  - 4y ago
chrisseaton 4y ago
This makes sense if your job is to teach them about the tools. If it's a software engineering or IT course then yeah. If it's an English Literature course then nobody cares about the tool used. Moleskine, Google Docs, Word, whatever, who cares. Google Docs is free. Why give yourself more hassle than that?
adamesque 4y ago
This isn't quite the right analogy; it's not the difference between a fancy tool you can't service yourself and a simple tool you can. It's like a world where everyone uses a particular kind of tool that works well and is expensive, but also… the standard. Everyone expects you to know how to use this tool to do a particular kind of common work. And then you come along and say, no, we should teach people how to use a _different_, cheaper tool! It doesn't work nearly as well, and isn't what people in the "real world" use, but if you spend years familiarizing yourself with a completely different field, you can service and maintain it yourself! You might not get many takers.
cortesoft 4y ago
Ok, now imagine you only have one person who knows how to use the boring drill, and they have 5,000 people to teach, and zero budget to hire anyone else. There is no way they could teach everyone, so they use the automatic one.
dahart 4y ago
> maybe we should teach the students how to use tools that work without all this extra cost and nonsense. Maybe we oughta collectively write better open source software if we want to opine on what schools should do? Gimp doesn’t have to suck, but it does. I say that with true love for gimp and admiration for the people who write it, and I can’t complain about it because I’m not helping write it. (But that is an option, you and I could contribute to gimp.) Part of the problem is that neither of your analogies are relevant in practice. Gimp isn’t a cheaper less automatic Photoshop, it’s a tool that often doesn’t meet professional workflows at all, and certainly wasn’t made kid friendly. It’s not the same tool and can’t do the same things. Also my kids were taught both gimp and photoshop, and they hated gimp. (And adobe makes photoshop available to schools for relatively cheap, compared to retail.) The analogy about the software being serviceable is not going to fly in schools. Submitting patches is not something teachers can do. Submitting bug reports isn’t either. So what good is a theoretical idea that the software is open? The only thing schools can do in practice is pay money for support. And money is the single biggest problem they have. Vague concerns about privacy and lock-in are just way down on the list of school & teacher priorities, right? I’m wildly in favor of having good open source software, of avoiding education market capture by for profit companies, and having insanely better privacy controls. Open source sounds awesome, but I think it needs to improve before we start demanding that people use it or teach to it.
asiachick 4y ago
You clearly don't know photoshop. A better comparison is Notepad vs VIM or Notepad vs Emacs. Notepad kind of works. You load, save, copy/cut/paste, find, save. What else do you need? Vim and Emacs have a learning curve but are way more powerful. If you don't understand how much more powerful Vim and Emacs are over notepad, most people who do know the difference would see the flaw in your opinion that all 3 are text editors and one is as good as another. The same is true of Photoshop vs gIMP. Photoshop has non-destructive editing. gIMP does not. That alone is a huge force multiplier. Photoshop has non-destructive layer and group styles, gIMP does not have layer styles as all. That's just few of the 100s of features Photoshop has that gIMP doesn't. They're not just minor features, they're force multipliers and game changers. gIMP has been planning to add the major ones for 15yrs or so but for whatever reasons has not gotten there. https://www.gimp.org/docs/userfaq.html#when-will-gimp-support-any-kind-of-non-destructive-editing-like-adjustment-layers-layer-filters-andor-full-blown-node-based-editing https://www.gimp.org/docs/userfaq.html#when-will-gimp-suppor...
- iggldiggl 4y ago
  > Photoshop has non-destructive editing. gIMP does not. That alone is a huge force multiplier. Oh yes. I'm not using Photoshop, but some hidden-secret alternative developed by two brothers from Bavaria (PhotoLine), because I'm only doing some small-scale private hobbyist stuff, and an (even at the time) slightly older version of their software had been included for free in a photography-themed edition of some computer magazine. That old version didn't have non-destructive layer effects (although even at that time it already supported non-destructive scaling/rotating/shearing of layers, which was quite nice, and which I gather GIMP doesn't support even today?). As my proficiency with it grew, I started running more and more into the limitations of that, until I eventually decided that maybe I should finally just buy a license for the current version of the software, since of the features it had gained in the intervening years was indeed non-destructive editing. This turned out to be absolutely the right decision, because non-destructive layers are indeed a game changer. No more making lots of backup copies of layers, no more clumsily noting down somewhere in the layer names or wherever what sort of effects I had applied in case I needed to re-tweak something, non-destructive liquifying, etc. etc. Plus a few nifty other features, and still the same familiar UI despite the large version jump, so absolutely no reason to regret the upgrade.
webmaven 4y ago
> Imagine you're teaching people carpentry. There is a really nice automatic screw gun that accepts a cartridge of screws all lined up automatically so each one loads in place after the last one. It is super easy to use and people can get straight to fastening beams together. But the device is very expensive, and they cannot be repaired if they break, [...] Wait, let me stop your metaphor right there. How often do you imagine end-user software like Photoshop or MS Office actually "breaks" in a way that actually requires "repair"? Imagine if you will, that most of the time that your magic screw gun happens to jam, that simply unplugging it and plugging it back in again magically cleared the problem up, and you could continue where you left off.
l33t2328 4y ago
The thing is that Adobe sweet offers a better product than GIMP. It’s easier to use which, like it or not, does matter. Upon from that, it has more capability out of the box than GIMP. If you care about teaching students to design good buildings, why waste a ton of time showing them how to place screws.
whywhywhywhy 4y ago
GIMP can’t even do CMYK or adjustment layers. Let’s please stop pretending it’s comparable to any modern image application, or even 15 years ago image application.

germinalphrase 4y ago

Your example is only apt when using the tool is the point of the learning. More realistically, the drill is supposed to be an entirely necessary but incidental aspect of the learning. In this scenario, any amount of time or effort expended on problem solve the drill is taking time away from the primary learning objective. This is why teachers use Word and Google Docs. They do not give a shit about the tool. The tool is a means to an end. Word and Docs are familiar. Word and Docs work.

bombcar 4y ago

This basically exists for drywall: https://www.milwaukeetool.com/Products/Power-Tools/Fastening/Screw-Guns/49-20-0001 https://www.milwaukeetool.com/Products/Power-Tools/Fastening... And it’s a different skill set for sure, but highly worth it - someone who knows how do use it can hang drywall by themselves pretty easily. If that’s your job, you should definitely know how to use it (and how to use just the gun, and the simple drill).

nonrandomstring 4y ago

"Principles not products". That's what I call it. I've always taught that way and my students love it. At least the ones smart enough to realise they're being given a proper ground up education. We do every step the hard way, breaking it down with a historical context, a rationale and exposure to several different basic tools that do that fundamental job. They get to see the continuum between logic and arithmetic operators and a full application stack. Right at the end I let them loose on full-blown commercial toys - and they love that too, because they can now see the value those polished applications add. They can also see what is just cosmetic fluff and marketing patter. It's only the weaker students who are quick to "demand the latest shiny industry standard gizmos... because, like, jobs". And of course the management twonks who've been blinded by vendor lobbying and kickbacks. Truth is, modern software is so slick any fool can grab a ready-made plugin-o-matic that thinks for you and wipes your arse, but without understanding principles the moment they change the GUI you're completely lost.

TheOtherHobbes 4y ago

That's a terrible analogy for the differences between Photoshop and Gimp. For one thing Photoshop is a transferrable skill. Gimp will get you laughed out the door of most photo studios and design agencies. For another - too many FOSS people just do not understand that tinkering with tools is not the point for most users. If you like tinkering with tools, go tinker with tools. Most people have work to do, and tinkering with tools is not something they want to be distracted by. Photoshop is far from being my favourite product, and Adobe are very far from being my favourite company. In fact I - and millions of other users - would be delighted if we could save $$$$ a year with a free alternative. Which applies in the general case. If FOSS was a realistic and workable alternative, it would storm the market and most people would be using it. But it isn't. Most FOSS applications are aimed at self-selecting technical users, and there's very limited interest in making tools for non-technical users. In fact IMO FOSS culture lacks the mindset and skills - and very possibly the empathy - to understand what general users want from their tools. It's been a success for developers who want to make technical tools for other developers. And also for infrastructure. Not to take anything from that, because that's both significant and true. But for popular non-expert applications? Simply - no.

KronisLV 4y ago
> For one thing Photoshop is a transferable skill. Gimp will get you laughed out the door of most photo studios and design agencies. This is pretty much a self-perpetuating cycle and what happens when you have something close to a monopoly. Everyone uses Photoshop, almost nobody uses GIMP. Everyone uses Chrome, almost nobody uses Firefox. Everyone uses Windows, almost nobody uses Linux and so on... Thankfully, in the server space, *nix reigns supreme and FOSS has a larger foothold, though thanks to the above, the "year of the Linux desktop" may as well never come. > Most FOSS applications are aimed at self-selecting technical users, and there's very limited interest in making tools for non-technical users. In fact IMO FOSS culture lacks the mindset and skills - and very possibly the empathy - to understand what general users want from their tools. I'd say that it's also a matter of prioritizing what's necessary to get things done and simply not having the resources for the rest: UX, marketing, branding, integrations and so on.
- 4y ago

chrisseaton 4y ago

This makes sense if your job is to teach them about the tools. If it's a software engineering or IT course then yeah. If it's an English Literature course then nobody cares about the tool used. Moleskine, Google Docs, Word, whatever, who cares. Google Docs is free. Why give yourself more hassle than that?

adamesque 4y ago

This isn't quite the right analogy; it's not the difference between a fancy tool you can't service yourself and a simple tool you can. It's like a world where everyone uses a particular kind of tool that works well and is expensive, but also… the standard. Everyone expects you to know how to use this tool to do a particular kind of common work. And then you come along and say, no, we should teach people how to use a _different_, cheaper tool! It doesn't work nearly as well, and isn't what people in the "real world" use, but if you spend years familiarizing yourself with a completely different field, you can service and maintain it yourself! You might not get many takers.

cortesoft 4y ago

Ok, now imagine you only have one person who knows how to use the boring drill, and they have 5,000 people to teach, and zero budget to hire anyone else. There is no way they could teach everyone, so they use the automatic one.

dahart 4y ago

> maybe we should teach the students how to use tools that work without all this extra cost and nonsense. Maybe we oughta collectively write better open source software if we want to opine on what schools should do? Gimp doesn’t have to suck, but it does. I say that with true love for gimp and admiration for the people who write it, and I can’t complain about it because I’m not helping write it. (But that is an option, you and I could contribute to gimp.) Part of the problem is that neither of your analogies are relevant in practice. Gimp isn’t a cheaper less automatic Photoshop, it’s a tool that often doesn’t meet professional workflows at all, and certainly wasn’t made kid friendly. It’s not the same tool and can’t do the same things. Also my kids were taught both gimp and photoshop, and they hated gimp. (And adobe makes photoshop available to schools for relatively cheap, compared to retail.) The analogy about the software being serviceable is not going to fly in schools. Submitting patches is not something teachers can do. Submitting bug reports isn’t either. So what good is a theoretical idea that the software is open? The only thing schools can do in practice is pay money for support. And money is the single biggest problem they have. Vague concerns about privacy and lock-in are just way down on the list of school & teacher priorities, right? I’m wildly in favor of having good open source software, of avoiding education market capture by for profit companies, and having insanely better privacy controls. Open source sounds awesome, but I think it needs to improve before we start demanding that people use it or teach to it.

asiachick 4y ago

You clearly don't know photoshop. A better comparison is Notepad vs VIM or Notepad vs Emacs. Notepad kind of works. You load, save, copy/cut/paste, find, save. What else do you need? Vim and Emacs have a learning curve but are way more powerful. If you don't understand how much more powerful Vim and Emacs are over notepad, most people who do know the difference would see the flaw in your opinion that all 3 are text editors and one is as good as another. The same is true of Photoshop vs gIMP. Photoshop has non-destructive editing. gIMP does not. That alone is a huge force multiplier. Photoshop has non-destructive layer and group styles, gIMP does not have layer styles as all. That's just few of the 100s of features Photoshop has that gIMP doesn't. They're not just minor features, they're force multipliers and game changers. gIMP has been planning to add the major ones for 15yrs or so but for whatever reasons has not gotten there. https://www.gimp.org/docs/userfaq.html#when-will-gimp-support-any-kind-of-non-destructive-editing-like-adjustment-layers-layer-filters-andor-full-blown-node-based-editing https://www.gimp.org/docs/userfaq.html#when-will-gimp-suppor...

iggldiggl 4y ago
> Photoshop has non-destructive editing. gIMP does not. That alone is a huge force multiplier. Oh yes. I'm not using Photoshop, but some hidden-secret alternative developed by two brothers from Bavaria (PhotoLine), because I'm only doing some small-scale private hobbyist stuff, and an (even at the time) slightly older version of their software had been included for free in a photography-themed edition of some computer magazine. That old version didn't have non-destructive layer effects (although even at that time it already supported non-destructive scaling/rotating/shearing of layers, which was quite nice, and which I gather GIMP doesn't support even today?). As my proficiency with it grew, I started running more and more into the limitations of that, until I eventually decided that maybe I should finally just buy a license for the current version of the software, since of the features it had gained in the intervening years was indeed non-destructive editing. This turned out to be absolutely the right decision, because non-destructive layers are indeed a game changer. No more making lots of backup copies of layers, no more clumsily noting down somewhere in the layer names or wherever what sort of effects I had applied in case I needed to re-tweak something, non-destructive liquifying, etc. etc. Plus a few nifty other features, and still the same familiar UI despite the large version jump, so absolutely no reason to regret the upgrade.

webmaven 4y ago

> Imagine you're teaching people carpentry. There is a really nice automatic screw gun that accepts a cartridge of screws all lined up automatically so each one loads in place after the last one. It is super easy to use and people can get straight to fastening beams together. But the device is very expensive, and they cannot be repaired if they break, [...] Wait, let me stop your metaphor right there. How often do you imagine end-user software like Photoshop or MS Office actually "breaks" in a way that actually requires "repair"? Imagine if you will, that most of the time that your magic screw gun happens to jam, that simply unplugging it and plugging it back in again magically cleared the problem up, and you could continue where you left off.

l33t2328 4y ago

The thing is that Adobe sweet offers a better product than GIMP. It’s easier to use which, like it or not, does matter. Upon from that, it has more capability out of the box than GIMP. If you care about teaching students to design good buildings, why waste a ton of time showing them how to place screws.

whywhywhywhy 4y ago

GIMP can’t even do CMYK or adjustment layers. Let’s please stop pretending it’s comparable to any modern image application, or even 15 years ago image application.