[K12OSN] Which Windows apps stand in the way of Linux use atyourschool?

Henry Hartley henryhartley at westat.com
Tue Oct 4 20:28:10 UTC 2005


On Tuesday, October 04, 2005 12:00 PM, Timothy Hart said:
>> 
>> I am curious as to what features that you need that GIMP can not
>> provide. Not really playing devils advocate here, just curious.
>> I know the lack of CMYK is a pretty big one for me. But having
>> used the GIMP for quite some time now, it has replaced Photoshop
>> for me in almost every way. Photoshop does have quite a few very
>> high end features that I rarely use, and students almost never
>> use. Please elaborate.

It isn't so much features that are missing as that it's harder to do
some of the things I want to do.  It may be a learning thing, where I
just haven't figured out the magic key/mouse combination that does what
I want.

This is off the top of my head.  Given a little time I think I could
come up with a longer list...

I often work with images that have a good number of layers (like 20 or
more, sometimes many more).  I'll often lock a few of them together so
they move as a unit.  Then, another group of two or three, also locked
together.  In GIMP (as far as I can tell) you can link layers but not in
multiple groups.  You have to unlink any that are linked, then link the
new group.  If you want to go back to the old group, you have to re-link
them.

When scaling layers there is no obvious way to force the aspect ratio to
be locked.  In Photoshop, simply holding down the [shift] key will do
that.  The documentation talks about this but I cannot find anything
that actually works.  So maybe it's coming.

When working with xcf files, I often print only to find that just the
current layer printed.

I also hate the way the image window resized itself so much.  You can
turn that "feature" off (and I have).

Pasting into an image has an extra step.  When you paste (Ctrl-V) the
image is pasted and the layer says "Floating Selection" and you have to
right click on that and select "New Layer".  That should be the default.
Or I should be able to make it the default.

If you click on the layer or anything in the tool "window" and forget to
reselect the image window, actions don't always work.  For instance, you
want to nudge a layer so you select the layer and hit the arrow key,
nothing happens (or the wrong thing happens).  You must reselect the
image before you can do that.  

I've reassigned a few keyboard shortcuts that I found particularly
annoying.  Like Z for the zoom (Magnify) tool and = for zoom in (instead
of + which requires you to shift - in some versions/platforms but
apparently not all).

Applying effects to type is another thing.  Add a drop shadow to text
and then edit the test.  When I started with Photoshop, it couldn't do
it either but it has been able to for quite some time now.

As I said, it's not so much a single feature that I need but more a
combination of things just being harder.  I use the GIMP when I can.
Oh, and as for photographs, I wish the GIMP would preserve (and even let
me edit) the EXIF information contained in JPEGs.  That would be really
nice.

-- 
Henry




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