On Thu, 18 Mar 2004 14:26:30 +0100, "Thorsten Froehlich"
<tho### [at] trfde> wrote:

>But those are panes, not windows!  Of course you should not arbitrarily
>sprinkle content between multiple windows.  Some common sense really helps,
>and it has nothing to do with windows inside windows - panes are not
>windows.

Well, with The GIMP you have the tools window (not a palette because
it has its own menus), then an image window per file each with its own
menus, then anywhere between 0 and 20 floating palettes, and none of
those is visually associated with any of the others nor with some
common element (root window, common workspace etc.) It's... strange.

Maybe my wording was not entirely correct from a GUI point of view but
I hope I made it clear now.


Peter Popov ICQ : 15002700
Personal e-mail : pet### [at] vipbg
TAG      e-mail : pet### [at] tagpovrayorg

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On 18 Mar 2004 05:15:27 -0500, Warp <war### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:

>  I don't understand what's this "alt-tab annoyance" of yours.

Well, if I open the GIMP and have three images open, then some
palettes - toolbox, layers, colors, tool options, brushes, etc. All of
them appear in the alt-tab pop-up and clutter it immensely because you
have to dig through it to find some other application you might need.
If it had a common root window/workspace, or is running in a nested X
server as I do it, all I get is a single icon which is The GIMP. Makes
much more sense to me that way.

>  If you have tons of windows in your root window and you don't like
>focusing them by clicking, you will have to browse through them
>anyways (in applications with a "root window" usually you do this
>with ctrl-tab).

But they don't get in the way when I alt-tab to switch applications.

>How is this different from using Gimp in a virtual desktop?
>I really don't get it.

The shortcut for switching desktops (if you have them at all - I
don't) is different, and alt-tab will still display all icons in all
desktops.

>If I want to switch to another different application, I just switch to
>the virtual desktop where that application is in.

That's another way to do it, I agree. In the original post I suggested
my way for those who haven't found another one. In any case both are
hacks to make up for IMHO poor GUI design, but that's a totally
different story altogether. I was just happy that I am finally able to
actually use The GIMP and wanted to share.


Peter Popov ICQ : 15002700
Personal e-mail : pet### [at] vipbg
TAG      e-mail : pet### [at] tagpovrayorg

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Peter Popov <pet### [at] vipbg> wrote:
> The shortcut for switching desktops (if you have them at all - I
> don't) is different, and alt-tab will still display all icons in all
> desktops.

  My KDE only shows the applications in the current desktop. I find this
behaviour useful.

-- 
plane{-x+y,-1pigment{bozo color_map{[0rgb x][1rgb x+y]}turbulence 1}}
sphere{0,2pigment{rgbt 1}interior{media{emission 1density{spherical
density_map{[0rgb 0][.5rgb<1,.5>][1rgb 1]}turbulence.9}}}scale
<1,1,3>hollow}text{ttf"timrom""Warp".1,0translate<-1,-.1,2>}//  - Warp -

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Peter Popov <pet### [at] vipbg> wrote:
> On 17 Mar 2004 23:51:18 -0500, Eamon Caddigan <eca### [at] uiucedu>
> wrote:
>
>>The "bunch of windows in a single window" paradigm is called Multiple
>>Document Interface (MDI), and I'll confess that I hate it. 
>
> Me too, but I am not talking about that. I am complaining about the
> "bunch of palettes and windows all over the desktop" paradigm of the
> GIMP, which is as I see it the biggest issue people have with it (and
> are flamed for when complaining :) ). It has nothing to do with MDI.

So you want Photoshop Windows (not Mac, as has already been pointed
out). It's the only way you're comfortable working, why not use it? This
isn't a flame, but a serious question. If what you want already exists,
why use something you don't want only to complain about it?

-Eamon

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On 18 Mar 2004 09:55:38 -0500, Eamon Caddigan <eca### [at] uiucedu>
wrote:

>So you want Photoshop Windows (not Mac, as has already been pointed
>out). It's the only way you're comfortable working, why not use it? This
>isn't a flame, but a serious question. If what you want already exists,
>why use something you don't want only to complain about it?

I actually use it -- have been since version 2.5 (granted, that was on
a Mac). But I also want to learn to use the GIMP and the lack of a
consistent workflow hinders me in my quest. Also, I am in the process
of completely switching to Linux and would like to get the best of it
-- for example, I am currently writing a conversion tool to import my
Windows ICQ 2002 history into Licq.

As per my original post, I found a way to avoid some problems I (and I
know many others) find annoying and wanted to share. As per some other
posts, which probably don't belong to this thread and maybe not even
to this group, I would like to find the reasoning behind the current
GIMP design from a useability point of view, since this is a somewhat
professional interest of mine. I do not want this to be a PS vs. GIMP
thread and even less so a flame war - I want to use the best of both
worlds and I believe I am on my way to doing so.


Peter Popov ICQ : 15002700
Personal e-mail : pet### [at] vipbg
TAG      e-mail : pet### [at] tagpovrayorg

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in news:mvaj50d6ikdjvgkipfhdj3fbbfv9o4ou91@4ax.com Peter Popov wrote:

> hen anywhere between 0 and 20 floating palettes, and none of
> those is visually associated with any of the others nor with some
> common element (root window, common workspace etc.) It's... strange.
> 

It was strange to me too at first, until I tried The Gimp in a two monitor 
situation. One screen for the image(s), one screen for all the pallettes 
and stuff so it gets to be a big control panel. Then it makes a lot more 
sense.

Ingo

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On 18 Mar 2004 10:53:21 -0500, ingo <ing### [at] tagpovrayorg> wrote:

>It was strange to me too at first, until I tried The Gimp in a two monitor 
>situation. One screen for the image(s), one screen for all the pallettes 
>and stuff so it gets to be a big control panel. Then it makes a lot more 
>sense.

Hard to do that on a six-years-old laptop :)


Peter Popov ICQ : 15002700
Personal e-mail : pet### [at] vipbg
TAG      e-mail : pet### [at] tagpovrayorg

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>   My KDE only shows the applications in the current desktop. I find this
> behaviour useful.

	IMHO this is the only setting that really makes sense of using
several virtual desktops, and I could not stand without (even fvwm is
able to do that).

	- NC

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In article <83ej50524q8fie3hl5ciqsrc1tmgc7e1vp@4ax.com>, pet### [at] vipbg 
says...
> As per my original post, I found a way to avoid some problems I (and I
> know many others) find annoying and wanted to share. As per some other
> posts, which probably don't belong to this thread and maybe not even
> to this group, I would like to find the reasoning behind the current
> GIMP design from a useability point of view, since this is a somewhat
> professional interest of mine. I do not want this to be a PS vs. GIMP
> thread and even less so a flame war - I want to use the best of both
> worlds and I believe I am on my way to doing so.
> 

You know.. One irony here is Paintshop Pro. It uses a system I think 
makes sense. The individual images are contained in a single MDI 
interface as it the toolbar. No need to scramble about trying to figure 
out which one you are working with. Adjustments to the tools, like 
changing opacity or size are handled with floating windows.

Then I try Gimp. Yes, I can position the 'image' window as I like, but 
there is no practical way to tile images, so I can work between them, 
even if there was, it would treat all the other floating windows as 
something to be tiled too. The floating windows are huge compared to the 
very small 'drop down when needed' tools used in PSP, so you can't get 
the damn things almost entirely out of your way if you want to make the 
image window full screen. Changing the magnification scale doesn't help 
matters. Opening a new image causes it to be either the wrong size 
(usually too small) or resizes to fit the image, so it is now not full 
screen anymore, etc..

I don't mind all the floating stuff, except it takes up room it doesn't 
need to when I am not actually using it and you can't get the main image 
window to behave in anything even approaching a sane and usable way as it 
exists. I much prefer PSP. Imho.. If Gimp's main tool window was smaller, 
taking up only the top of the screen, its other gadgets where drop down, 
that just showed the basic title of the toolset, these things remained 
floating on the 'top' of the other windows and Gimp was smart enough to 
'tile' or 'stack' images in the space below the main toolbar (and to not 
screw up the tiling if you zoom in or out on one of the images), I would 
have been quite happy. MDI isn't really necessary for something like 
this, but Gimp's implementation of a purely floating and disjointed 
window system is irritating in the extreme. Even a badly designed MDI 
would be better in many ways.

I agree with someone else's post, the current design is practical with 
more than one display. However, I agree with you that on a single display 
it is far more irritating that useful.

-- 
void main () {

    call functional_code()
  else
    call crash_windows();
}

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> Is anyone here using The GIMP? If so, do you find it awkward that it
> doesn't feature a root window as in PhotoShop, PhotoPaint, PSP,
> Painter and virtually every single graphics app out there?
> 
> I do. I hate accidentally clicking outside the image area and have a
> background application pop up. Also, I hate it when I have to alt-tab
> through a dozen GIMP windows, all with the same icon, to find the
> right one.

At first, I thought it to be very annoying, too. And I still think it's 
annoying when I try to use Gimp with my mouse only. But when you use 
your keyboard a lot, it really gets better (Although it's a shame that 
there is no shortcut for the tool's option dialog).

But I have to admit that dockable windows in a root window would be a 
better way to go (if you can't afford 2 monitors, *seigh*). The problem 
with this solution is that the screen can be too crowded. I've seen this 
for example in QtDesigner (which is a pain, although I think Qt has some 
great potential). There you got the "Tools" window and the "object 
property" window and so on. All of them are designed rather big (the KDE 
theme I'm using might add some size, too), and so there's not much left 
to design dialogs in. OTOH, you need almost all of those windows the 
most time. Again, the PhotoShop way is a good way IMHO. Press some keys 
(I think it's tab) and the tool windows etc. disappear. Press the key 
again and they're back. Wonderful :)

And if we are talking about annoying Gimp features - does anyone think 
that the text tool is something one can really work with? Either I'm 
doing something completely wrong, or the developper of that tool should 
be sent to *some bad and evil spot full of bad interfaces". Hm. Perhaps 
he should be forced to use all the programs described in the "Interface 
Hall of Shame" (http://tinyurl.com/nc3q always worth a visit to see how 
you should *not* do it).

Just my 2 cents,
Florian

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