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Hai guise,

It's been a long time since I have posted on GIMP-user, but the steady stream of bothersome "issues" in the Windoze version reported in recent posts has inspired me to comment on some bugs and annoyances I have worked through or around in recent months, using GIMP 2.8 on Linux Mint with the Cinnamon and XFCE desktop environments. Why should the Microsoft inmates have all the fun?

1) Path from text is fail.

Being able to convert a text object to a vector path is very useful when, for instance, one needs to draw a clean outline around text, or apply arbitrary distortions to the geometry of some text. However, with the 32 bit version of GIMP 2.8, the text to path command generates a vector path for about the first 25 to 30% of the letters in the text layer and stops - that's all folks, hope you enjoyed the show.

I know of two solutions for this: The better one is to get a new computer - text to path works normally (here) in the 64 bit version of GIMP 2.8. I think this reflects developers using "modern" 64 bit systems - whatever the problem is, it's probably unique to the 32 bit Linux version of the GIMP and goes unnoticed elsewhere.

My other solution is a work-around: Duplicate the text layer, convert it into an image layer ("discard text information"), do 'alpha to selection' in the Layers dialog, and do 'selection to path' in the Paths dialog. Results are less precise than the native 'text to path' tool, but adequate for most of the things I do - and cheaper than a new computer.

2) Tear-off menus are fail

As we know, there is no need to dig down to deeply buried menu items over and over, to use them over and over: Click on the dotted line in the dialog box your command lives in, and it pops loose as a floating menu that does not close when the command is executed. But, in the Gnome family of desktop environments, torn-off menus do not work: Click on the menu items all you want, nothing happens.

The work-around for this is stupidly simple, once you know about it: Click the command item you want to select it, then hit the space bar on your keyboard to make it actually happen. Ta-daa. It took me ages to get around to hunting down this work-around. I am sure lots of users will just get stuck there and give up on tear-off menus, so it's probably worthwhile for the devs to address this problem as/where possible: I also see this behavior in Bluefish, so it's apparently more a GTK on Gnome problem than a GIMP one.

3) Brushes dockable dialog causes full screen mode fail

I have been playing with the full screen mode for GIMP and I am starting to get somewhat used to it - when working with multiple images open, the tabbed interface in the canvas area is quite convenient. One thing, though: I ain't gonna quit configuring the tools so that all my frequently used dockable dialogs are available as tabs in one dock, directly under the Toolbox (which I keep 7 or 8 buttons wide). That's easy to set up but, add the Brushes dialog and - oops, the dock area now fills half the width of the screen, with the toolbox strung out sideways above it, and can not be restored to normal width by any means I have tried - except one work-around that prevents the problem from appearing at all.

Through brute force and total ignorance - my preferred solution to any problem - I discovered that opening the Brushes dialog as a floating dock, then dragging and dropping it into the existing fixed position dock, adds it to that dock without blowing the thing up to half screen size. So I opened the GIMP, opened the Brushes dialog as a floater, and in the Preferences > Window Management menu, unchecked "Save window positions on exit" and did "Save window positions now." After this, when the GIMP opens I can drag and drop the floating Brushes dialog into the dock where I want it without wrecking the whole layout. This adds about one second to the time it takes to get the GIMP open and running.

I always have to select my preferred "general purpose" brush every time the program opens anyway (save tool options my @ss), and the work-around described here puts that little annoyance right in front of me for one-click solution every time I open the GIMP.

4) Other than dynamic brushes

This is not so much an annoyance, as pointing out some relatively little known configuration options that should probably be defaults.

I really enjoy the new-ish brush dynamics features, they make a lot of cool stuff possible. But the most useful "dynamic" feature for brush tools requires user configuration to exist, and most users probably don't suspect it is possible: Changing brush size and hardness with a keyboard shortcut + mouse wheel. The menu to set this up is at Preferences > Input Controllers (where it belongs), out of sight and out of mind. My own setup for this makes sense to me and does not reassign any default key bindings:

Preferences > Input Controllers > Main Mouse Wheel opens a Configure Input Controller dialog when double clicked. Once there, set up:

Scroll Up (Alt) = tools-paint-brush-size-increase Scroll Down (Alt) = tools-paint-brush-size-decrease Scroll Up (Shift+Ctrl+Alt) = context-brush-hardness-decrease Scroll Down (Shift+Ctrl_Alt) = context-brush-hardness-increase

Lots of other key combinations are possible; I just find these easy to reach and easy to remember when working. Regardless, this beats the hell out of changing brushes, or editing the current one, every time you need to change the size or fuzziness of your active brush. I think this should be a default, and widely advertised in manuals and tutorials - it's a huge time saver that translates to higher quality end products.

:o)

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On 07/02/2014 03:07 PM, Liam R E Quin wrote:

On Wed, 02 Jul 2014 14:32:13 -0400 Steve Kinney wrote: [...]

I always have to select my preferred "general purpose" brush every time the program opens anyway

I don't have to do this, but that may be because I have Paint Options Shared Between Tools checked in edit/preferences...

I just had to set things up as I wanted, and do Save tool options now.

All rightey then! I think I must have been the problem here: I did have Paint Options Shared Between Tools set, and I know I unchecked "save on exit" and hit the "save now" button.

But I just opened the program to get the name of the brush it always selects on open and, um, there was NO brush selected. I picked my generic one, saved the tool options, bounced the program and voila: The correct brush was selected. That saves me about 200 milliseconds per session! Yay! :)

4) Other than dynamic brushes But the most useful "dynamic" feature for brush tools requires user configuration to exist, and most users probably don't suspect it is possible: Changing brush size and hardness with a keyboard shortcut + mouse wheel.

Note that by default (depending on your keyboard) [ { and ] } increase/decrease the size of an editable brush. You may need to change that in edit/keys if it doesn't work for you; it's increase/decrease value 2 I think.

I saw that, but dodged it for for several reasons: First, I try to keep my left hand on its "home keys" for image editing while I am working; it's a long reach from there to the brackets. Also, the default method seems to use larger increments of size change than I like. But mostly I just like dialing the brush size up and down with the mouse wheel; it's all analog and stuff.

When changing brush hardness with the settings I noted earlier, there's nothing to see on the canvas (even the brush outline vanishes during the operation), but the notification area below the canvas shows the hardness % as it goes up and down.

:o)

Steve

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