Way too many people care because what helps keep it "free as in beer" is the work of tens of thousands of people letting it be free for you. "Image Studio" has no identity. There are tons of "image studios" out there already. How many of them do you know? Besides, if you google "gimp" you'll know where you'll land. Google "Image studio" and see where you go. It'll end up being "yet another puppy trying to imitate Photoshop". Let the GIMP's identity be.
Yeah, right. Like names like "Google" or "Yahoo" or "Linux" were going anywhere? Grow up. It's a program that has its own identity. The people who created it did it with passion and they love working on this program. Rename it to something else and the multitude of people who already know it as "The GIMP" will be confused. Learn something about brand identity already. Besides, an odd name like "The GIMP" is exactly what breaks the monotony of names like "Photoshop". Welcome back to Earth.
I do agree with most of what you have written, but I would like to add my 2 cents to the picture.
I wish we could simply ignore CVS and Subversion altogether. If you are learning about these tools, learn them only to check code out of repositories and to acquire a basic working knowledge, but avoid depending on centralized SCMs as much as possible. If you would like something that fits the human way of working, use a decentralized or distributed SCM like git, mercurial, or even bazaar-ng.
A good side-effect of this is that you are then free to do whatever you wish to with the code you obtain. If what you do grows into something good you can easily ask people to pull/merge from you. This helps you get involved into FOSS development without the "elitist" politics to a certain extent while also giving you enough opportunity to learn and contribute.
Be prepared to throw away code you think is excellent and also to face criticism and rejection. This is all a good learning experience.
Communication is one important factor a good programmer never ignores. If you have a question to ask, *ask* it and be specific. Do not shy away even if the question sounds too simple or stupid. Before sending a patch or fix, always ask the developers for their opinions and whether they think a patch is really necessary. I have had my patches rejected even after communicating well. Some patches are too trivial to be accepted. Some are massive and unacceptable. Keep the right balance.
How many times have you used or written software and wished there was some helpful documentation available for it? Read and write documentation so your code doesn't look like a big ball of spaghetti with no real purpose.
Internationalization is another area you can contribute to. People like viewing their applications in their native languages, and trust me, there are far too many people that do not speak English than those that do. So "I will speak your native language as long as it is English" is definitely not the correct approach to writing software.
Graphics are required everywhere. Without those little icons, you would find it difficult to identify your favorite applications, for instance. If you're good at creating them, share them!
There are several areas of FOSS that you can contribute to, not just code. Be polite, helpful, keep your eyes and ears open, and don't be rigid with your opinions. Opinions can change unless ego comes into the picture--you just need to be convincing enough.
Work with the team. And most importantly, be humble. We're all humans with a cause.
Slashdot Mirror
Yesterday is history. Tomorrow is a mystery. Today is a gift. That is why it is called present.
Way too many people care because what helps keep it "free as in beer" is the work of tens of thousands of people letting it be free for you. "Image Studio" has no identity. There are tons of "image studios" out there already. How many of them do you know? Besides, if you google "gimp" you'll know where you'll land. Google "Image studio" and see where you go. It'll end up being "yet another puppy trying to imitate Photoshop". Let the GIMP's identity be.
Yeah, right. Like names like "Google" or "Yahoo" or "Linux" were going anywhere? Grow up. It's a program that has its own identity. The people who created it did it with passion and they love working on this program. Rename it to something else and the multitude of people who already know it as "The GIMP" will be confused. Learn something about brand identity already. Besides, an odd name like "The GIMP" is exactly what breaks the monotony of names like "Photoshop". Welcome back to Earth.
I do agree with most of what you have written, but I would like to
add my 2 cents to the picture.
I wish we could simply ignore CVS and Subversion altogether.
If you are learning about these tools, learn them only to check code
out of repositories and to acquire a basic working knowledge,
but avoid depending on centralized SCMs as much as possible.
If you would like something that fits the human way of working,
use a decentralized or distributed SCM like git, mercurial, or
even bazaar-ng.
A good side-effect of this is that you are then free to do whatever you
wish to with the code you obtain. If what you do grows into something good
you can easily ask people to pull/merge from you. This helps you get
involved into FOSS development without the "elitist" politics to a
certain extent while also giving you enough opportunity to learn
and contribute.
Be prepared to throw away code you think is excellent and also
to face criticism and rejection. This is all a good learning experience.
Communication is one important factor a good programmer never ignores.
If you have a question to ask, *ask* it and be specific.
Do not shy away even if the question sounds too simple or stupid.
Before sending a patch or fix, always ask the developers for their
opinions and whether they think a patch is really necessary.
I have had my patches rejected even after communicating well.
Some patches are too trivial to be accepted. Some are massive and
unacceptable. Keep the right balance.
How many times have you used or written software and wished there was some
helpful documentation available for it? Read and write documentation
so your code doesn't look like a big ball of spaghetti with no real purpose.
Internationalization is another area you can contribute to.
People like viewing their applications in their native languages,
and trust me, there are far too many people that do not speak
English than those that do. So "I will speak your native language as long
as it is English" is definitely not the correct approach to writing
software.
Graphics are required everywhere. Without those little icons,
you would find it difficult to identify your favorite applications,
for instance. If you're good at creating them, share them!
There are several areas of FOSS that you can contribute to, not
just code. Be polite, helpful, keep your eyes and ears open,
and don't be rigid with your opinions. Opinions can change
unless ego comes into the picture--you just need to be convincing
enough.
Work with the team. And most importantly, be humble.
We're all humans with a cause.
Regards,
Yesudeep.