6 ms·

I love gimp, love that it's free, but I really wish they paid a little more attention to the usability There's all these minor issues that get on your nerves

I love gimp, love that it's free, but I really wish they paid a little more attention to the usability There's all these minor issues that get on your nerves If it was just a bit more user friendly, I would not need Photoshop

Funes- 7y ago
>There's all these minor issues that get on your nerves Have you tried reaching out to the developers in order to make your issues visible?
ogrisel 7y ago
The blog post highlights specifically usability improvements so they do pay attention to the usability. Rather that state vague generic complaints, please be more constructive and be specific by highlighting the most important usability issues you encountered in your own experience and see if other users agree with your analysis by reporting it to the issue tracker.
- jmalkin 7y ago
  This wasn't the place to list all my specific complaints, so I didn't
  - prokoudine 7y ago
    https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gimp/issues https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gimp/issues, however, is exactly the place ;-)
    - jmalkin 7y ago
      I think UX issues, without data backing them up, are just opinions for the most part. I don't feel very comfortable putting them in a bug tracker. I wonder if they have UX trained people doing research and so on.
      - prokoudine 7y ago
        We don't have such people. Opinions are fine. Gotta start somewhere.
Crinus 7y ago
I'll agree as long as you do not see Photoshop as the end goal for user friendliness :-P. Personally i have used Photoshop only a little and every time i used it i found it much harder than GIMP for the tasks i wanted it. I'd like it if GIMP became more user friendly but i'd really wouldn't want GIMP to become more like Photoshop as i do not see that program as user friendly. (for reference, the image editor i see as the most user friendly is Paint Shop Pro, especially versions 5 to 7 - and note that i mean the most user friendly, not the most capable or robust)
- jmalkin 7y ago
  Have not tried Paint Shop Pro since the 00's!! Maybe I'll try it again
  - Crinus 7y ago
    Note that i mention, i haven't used any version above PSP7 (well, i have used 8 and 9 and i wasn't happy so i reverted to 7 and nowadays the use some onerous DRM so i do not even consider it). PSP7 works perfectly fine on Windows 10 though.
- cptskippy 7y ago
  I personally found Corel Photopaint to be the most user friendly up until I stopped using it over a decade ago. I use Photoshop for work and sometimes Gimp but have never fully embraced either because the UI is so bad IMO. I actually try to do as much as possible in Inkscape whose UI isn't perfect but the benefits of SVG make working with it a much more palpable.
  - Crinus 7y ago
    Note that i refer specifically to PSP versions 5 to 7. In version 8 (or 9, i do not remember) they rewrote the UI which was much slower and had several issues (not only the UI but also some of the tools) and last i heard after it was bought by Corel (after PSP9) it became even worse. I haven't used Photopaint myself so i can't judge.
  - 7y ago
bovermyer 7y ago
Perhaps Affinity Photo is more your speed?
mwexler 7y ago
In 1995 or so, gimp was first released. Everyone loved it, but complained about usability (floating palettes, etc.). Maintainers, various devs, the crowd all said "it's open source, we can fix it". In 2019, gimp made it's most recent release. Everyone loved it, but complained about usability. Maintainers, various devs, (plugin authors), the crowd all said "it's open source, we can fix it". It's unlikely to get "fixed". Everything has quirks. But given how great it is on the whole, I suspect we'll see it continue to grow for another 20 or years, with similar complaints on usability for each release. In this world of ever-changing everything, it's good to see some stability: gimp is still there, and it's users continue to wish it's usability was better.
- RandomBacon 7y ago
  How about a bounty? I imagine there are a lot of people who would give money to whomever made it happen. I will give $500 USD to whomever made it substantially more Photoshop-like. Would others do the same? Is there someone recognizeable and trustworthy to run this?
  - BeetleB 7y ago
    Although even I don't like some usability aspects of Gimp, keep in mind that many Gimp users do not want a Photoshop-like interface. We want Photoshop-like features, which are being worked on.
  - akeck 7y ago
    I see your point, but I've been using Gimp since around 1998. If they made it more Photoshop-like, though, I think I'd be lost. ;-)
  - cmurf 7y ago
    It'd need more like $50,000 to even support a dev team to create a design plan. A bounty isn't going to work for something this significant. As an occasional user of Photoshop and GIMP, I cannot recommend merely rearranging the deck chairs, which is what it would be to make GIMP more Photoshop-like. Photoshop's usability is not good, it's just very familiar for those who are familiar with it. If you plop someone in front of Photoshop for the first time, they are unequivocally lost. Even an expert photographer or old-school film retoucher are lost. There's a huge ecosystem of Photoshop training because of this, and the approaches and styles are highly varied. Some tools are specialized and usability is a distraction. GIMP is extremely usable. That's what matters.
h1d 7y ago
Sad reality is that nothing matters if the other side gives you PSD file. You're stuck with Photoshop.
- kekeke 7y ago
  Afaik PSD support has been improved significantly as of late.

Funes- 7y ago

>There's all these minor issues that get on your nerves Have you tried reaching out to the developers in order to make your issues visible?

ogrisel 7y ago

The blog post highlights specifically usability improvements so they do pay attention to the usability. Rather that state vague generic complaints, please be more constructive and be specific by highlighting the most important usability issues you encountered in your own experience and see if other users agree with your analysis by reporting it to the issue tracker.

jmalkin 7y ago
This wasn't the place to list all my specific complaints, so I didn't
- prokoudine 7y ago
  https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gimp/issues https://gitlab.gnome.org/GNOME/gimp/issues, however, is exactly the place ;-)
  - jmalkin 7y ago
    I think UX issues, without data backing them up, are just opinions for the most part. I don't feel very comfortable putting them in a bug tracker. I wonder if they have UX trained people doing research and so on.
    - prokoudine 7y ago
      We don't have such people. Opinions are fine. Gotta start somewhere.

Crinus 7y ago

I'll agree as long as you do not see Photoshop as the end goal for user friendliness :-P. Personally i have used Photoshop only a little and every time i used it i found it much harder than GIMP for the tasks i wanted it. I'd like it if GIMP became more user friendly but i'd really wouldn't want GIMP to become more like Photoshop as i do not see that program as user friendly. (for reference, the image editor i see as the most user friendly is Paint Shop Pro, especially versions 5 to 7 - and note that i mean the most user friendly, not the most capable or robust)

jmalkin 7y ago
Have not tried Paint Shop Pro since the 00's!! Maybe I'll try it again
- Crinus 7y ago
  Note that i mention, i haven't used any version above PSP7 (well, i have used 8 and 9 and i wasn't happy so i reverted to 7 and nowadays the use some onerous DRM so i do not even consider it). PSP7 works perfectly fine on Windows 10 though.
cptskippy 7y ago
I personally found Corel Photopaint to be the most user friendly up until I stopped using it over a decade ago. I use Photoshop for work and sometimes Gimp but have never fully embraced either because the UI is so bad IMO. I actually try to do as much as possible in Inkscape whose UI isn't perfect but the benefits of SVG make working with it a much more palpable.
- Crinus 7y ago
  Note that i refer specifically to PSP versions 5 to 7. In version 8 (or 9, i do not remember) they rewrote the UI which was much slower and had several issues (not only the UI but also some of the tools) and last i heard after it was bought by Corel (after PSP9) it became even worse. I haven't used Photopaint myself so i can't judge.
- 7y ago

bovermyer 7y ago

Perhaps Affinity Photo is more your speed?

mwexler 7y ago

In 1995 or so, gimp was first released. Everyone loved it, but complained about usability (floating palettes, etc.). Maintainers, various devs, the crowd all said "it's open source, we can fix it". In 2019, gimp made it's most recent release. Everyone loved it, but complained about usability. Maintainers, various devs, (plugin authors), the crowd all said "it's open source, we can fix it". It's unlikely to get "fixed". Everything has quirks. But given how great it is on the whole, I suspect we'll see it continue to grow for another 20 or years, with similar complaints on usability for each release. In this world of ever-changing everything, it's good to see some stability: gimp is still there, and it's users continue to wish it's usability was better.

RandomBacon 7y ago
How about a bounty? I imagine there are a lot of people who would give money to whomever made it happen. I will give $500 USD to whomever made it substantially more Photoshop-like. Would others do the same? Is there someone recognizeable and trustworthy to run this?
- BeetleB 7y ago
  Although even I don't like some usability aspects of Gimp, keep in mind that many Gimp users do not want a Photoshop-like interface. We want Photoshop-like features, which are being worked on.
- akeck 7y ago
  I see your point, but I've been using Gimp since around 1998. If they made it more Photoshop-like, though, I think I'd be lost. ;-)
- cmurf 7y ago
  It'd need more like $50,000 to even support a dev team to create a design plan. A bounty isn't going to work for something this significant. As an occasional user of Photoshop and GIMP, I cannot recommend merely rearranging the deck chairs, which is what it would be to make GIMP more Photoshop-like. Photoshop's usability is not good, it's just very familiar for those who are familiar with it. If you plop someone in front of Photoshop for the first time, they are unequivocally lost. Even an expert photographer or old-school film retoucher are lost. There's a huge ecosystem of Photoshop training because of this, and the approaches and styles are highly varied. Some tools are specialized and usability is a distraction. GIMP is extremely usable. That's what matters.

h1d 7y ago

Sad reality is that nothing matters if the other side gives you PSD file. You're stuck with Photoshop.

kekeke 7y ago
Afaik PSD support has been improved significantly as of late.