By "respectable", you probably mean "those who agree with global warming." Also, science isn't something you put up to a vote. A majority of "respectable scientists" thought the sun revolved around the earth until Copernicus proved otherwise.
Sure, but "respectable" back then meant "not contradicting the church." Recognition of global warming is the modern equivalent of recognizing that the Earth does, in fact, revolve around the sun.
If it's so readily apparent, why can't I see it where I live? You want to prove global warming is happening, then provide the proof. Don't expect me to go looking for something I don't think is there. The burden of proof lies with you, my friend.
That is like saying, "if the Earth really does revolve around the sun, why can't I see it where I live without a telescope? Don't expect me to go looking for a heliocentric solar system that I don't think is there." If you are not willing to look at the evidence outside your own little world, don't even bother commenting on the subject of global warming.
The US would need to make some serious sacrifices to obey Kyoto.
Why is it that, on one hand, we hear from Kyoto detractors that Kyoto is a "joke" and then the same people recognize how much of a sacrafice we'd have to make to obey it. Seems to me that it is not, in fact, a joke. Rather, it is something very serious. It is a start.
Keep in mind that most of the US lives much, much more sparsely than Europeans. They are not (for the most part) crowded into dense polluted cities.
WHile it might be true that US citizens are less densley packed than Europeans, the majority of Americans live in metropolitan areas and not in rural areas. Also, European cities, with the exception of Paris, seem much cleaner than most American cities. Maybe there is some major underlying polution that I am just not aware of, but as far as I can tell, they are pretty darn clean compared to New York, Chicago, Detroit, LA, etc.
Despite the dire claims, we have yet to see any REAL environmental disaster.
And we probably won't see a singular disaster. The environment has been, and will continue to be in gradual decline as underground water tables dwindle, atmospheric CO2 rises, rainforests get slashed and burned, etc, etc etc. Just because many people (including you, apparently) have misinterpretted the warnings as pronouncements of imminent doom, doens't mean they are invalid.
The air and water seem pretty good. Weather seems normal.
In post-industrial nations, yes. This is largely true. But guess why it is this way. Because of environmentalists making a fuss about it. Although the air and water could be cleaner. We still have work to do. Why is it that I shouldn't eat fish out of Lake Michigan or the Mississppi River? These are major fresh water ways and we woudln't be wise to eat or drink directly from them. Everyone knows these water ways are full of pollution.
Kyoto WOULD create a nasty economic downturn. Everyone over 30 can remember the last one, and it wasn't pretty. Worse, the Kyoto downturn would be PERMANENT.
Gee, talk about doom and gloom. Economic disaster is right around the corner if we enact stricter environmental standards! Oh no! Permanent Great Depression ahead! Whatever you do, don't act in an environmentally responsible manner! What you don't seem to realize is that the economy survived the major environmental regulations of the 70's. Our cars are MUCH cleaner. It was tough, but we did it. We are all better off for it. But we can't stop now. THere are many more improvements to be made.
I seem to recall a time in history when industry leaders insisted that if we enact child labor laws, the economy would suffer horribly and permanently. BUt here we are today with our children enjoying their childhoods without needing to work for peanuts in sweatshops. Yeah, maybe some industries found it difficult at first to get by without cheap child labor. It was the same way with slavery in the South. Southerners felt that slavery was necessary for economic survival. But eventually it worked out. And we are better off for it. The environment is very much the same, IMO. Environmentalists are the modern day abolitionists even if they do lack some of the moral imperitive.
I know the US has taken a lot of flack for not signing on, but I have to wonder what it means to sign the treaty when you know you can't meet the requirements, much less even have a plan. At least the US was honest enough to admit they couldn't (wouldn't?) do it.
Too bad we weren't honest enough to stay out of that silly Geneva Convention thing.;-)
Look at it this way - no executive or manager is going to tell their staff to care *less* about customers, are they?
No, but they could at least try to come up with something meaningful to say. Nobody but a manager really knows what becoming "more customer focused" really means. What a mmanager might say is something like "stop making silly, mocking faces while talking to customers on the phone and don't assume they are morons." But then again, maybe scolding employees isn't the best motivating force.
Usenet needs to die. As I've said before, its only real function is as an online replacement for the conventional mental health system.
Isn't this enough to justify its existence?:)
There are plenty of other forms of communication online now.
But none that compare to usenet in scope and function. The NNTP protocol may be replaced, but the functionality that usenet as a whole provides will not disappear. Enough people still want a global, public forum system with a choice in user interfaces. Isolated web forums with crappy, proprietary interfaces don't cut it. Usenet, like Email, allows me as a user to chose whatever reader I want. I can't do that with web forums. I am stuck with their choice of web interface.
The Internet has been slowly moving away from generalised, one-size-(doesn't)-fit-all forms of communication segregated forms classified according to interests and comparitive levels of mental health, among other things. That also is exactly how it ought to be. I'm not saying that I believe any particular group should not be allowed to exist...all should, and all generally serve a purpose. What I *have* always been a very firm believer in however is voluntary segregation. It works, and it's better for everyone concerned.
Really, i think you have it backwards. The Internet, pretty much by definiton, is a combining of disparate and segregated networks and services into generalized and standardized formats. Email (SMTP), Web (HTTP/HTML), etc. What you are suggesting is that we go BACK to the time when we had distinct information services such as private BBS, AOL, Compuserve, Prodigy, university networks, etc. All of which required voluntary membership to. All of which had varying level of mental health among users... everthing you describe. It worked, but the trend is to move away from such a model and to generalized "one-size-fits-all" model. USENET was one of the earliest attempts at this. While it might be aging as a technology, it is part of the larger trend of the Internet to move away from segregation.
So basically what you are saying is that web forums don't really offer more "features" than usenet. They're simply different beasts that serve different purposes (generally).
Having said that, there is no way to explain how the contamination of Basrah occured, because almost all the time during and after the battles when uranium aerosols were being released, the prevailing winds would have been blowing them away from the city. Some people have suggested some kind of food-chain contamination, relating to either goats or birds.
How far is the wind goign to blow something as dense as uranium compounds?
In any case, it's pretty dumb to insist on "correct" labels when most of the people you're talking to have no idea what the labels mean.
I'm sure there are plenty of slashdotters who understand the correct labels for the various developmental disorders. These same people might also have some knowledge of good software for different disabilities. These are the people who should be answering the question. People who don't know the correct "labels" aren't going to know the correct software.
Huh? I didn't say slashdotters shouldn't be asked the question. I suggested that the information provided is not adaquate for giving a worthwhile answer and that anyone who is satisified with "he can't read or write" is certainly not going to give a worthwhle answer. Whether or not more information should involve a DSM diagnosis is irrelevant at this point (although it would help). This guy obviously has some serious disabilities that need to be specifically addressed. There is a big difference between autism and down syndrome, for example. You can't treat them the same.
How many people at Slashdot know the DSM? The questioner is appealing to out knowledge of computer software, not our training in developmental psychology. From our point of view, "He can't read or write very well" is a perfectly adequate description.
If "he can't read or write well" is adaquate, then Slashdot was the wrong place to ask the question.
I actually do have some familiarity with the DSM having had my own mental abberations submitted to its Procrustean taxonomy. I'm tempted to make some critical comments, but life's too short. Suffice to say that the headshrinkers I most respect consider it useful for finding appropriate rituals to appease the Insurance Gods, nothing more.
Be that as it may, you can't ignore the value of knowing the nature of an individual's problems before giving any worthwhile advice. "He can't read or write well" just doesn't cut it.
It is not uncommon for humans to introduce one pest to get rid of another just to find that the new pest is just that, a pest. AFAIK, we can't know for sure all the long term effects of being infected with an engineered HIV. What if it is one small mutation away from causing some serious problems? 5 billion walking petri dishs seems like a pretty good opportunity for such a mutation. Scientists are doing some really amazing things, but they can screw up royally just like anyone else. Pardom me if I don't have absolute faith. I wouldn't fully accept this new cancer treatment unless I could be assured that the virus will die off or self destruct once the job is done. Seems to me like it would die off in the absense of its preferred home, cancer cells, but I'd like to know for sure. ANd of course, IANAB.
I guess that's fair, but not everyone believes in science so it might upset some people.
You'd have to be an idiot to not believe in science (that it exists and makes valid and useful discoveries). Science with a capital S is something else entirely, though. It woudl seem to imply some kind of religion or life philosophy... and only an idiot would believe in it.
Isn't that what are bodies are already doing as we speak? There is a constant battle going on that you are not aware of. If this new HIV variant is otherwise inert, I don't see any problem using it to attack cancer cells. Although it would kinda suck to find that the HIV stuck around even after its job was done. Eventually everone would have it.
No, we were discussing the implication of your statement in the context of your perception of the posters expectation - not mine.
Ok, then it is the other person who seems to think that "freely given" implies "expects me to use." Use it or don't use it. There is no implicit expectation.
The same users who have issues which you think shouldn't to be addressed, no doubt.
I didn't say anything "shouldn't be addressed." I just think that saying "developer egos conflict with standards" is not constructive criticism and fails to take into account the target audience of the GIMP and what GIMP has already contributed to current standards in OSS, namely, GTK+.
Here's a slice of the inkscape FAQ:"inkscape was founded in 2003 by four Sodipodi developers with the mission of creating a fully compliant SVG drawing tool written in C++ with a new, HIG-compliant interface"
Of course, anyone is free to fork GIMP and make it fully compliant with a GNOME desktop environment. It already uses the appropriate X toolkit, which is most of the battle, so it shouldn't be that difficult. Yet I don't see anyone doing it. It would seem as though the people who use or would use GIMP are sufficiently satisfied with the way it functions on a modern Linux desktop. This may change. And when it does, it does. That is the way OSS works.
Hmmm. So, in the context of your original post, poster was supposed to stop "whineing" and be grateful to the people "working for free to give you software". Well, pray, why would someone give me software if they didn't expect me to use it?
It is "given" only in that it is freely available. Use it or don't use it. There is no expectation except maybe in your own mind.
Yes but it's [OOo] still the Great White Hope of OSS office software isn't it?
As direct competition for MS Office, perhaps. But usable alternatives do exist. Personally, I wouldn't use any Linux application that compared directly to MS OFfice. I wouldn't use MS Office. I simply do not need 80% of the functionality.
A photoshop port may also suffer the same disadvantages, but be sufficiently tooled and usable in a way that's acceptable to the majority of users, that it would do to GIMP what OOo has done to Abisuite, the original Gnome Office , KOffice and yes, Wordperfect for Linux (which was an old style X/*nix app - just like GIMP)
The current incarnation of The GIMP is far more complete and functional compared to Photoshop than Abisuite or KOffice are compared to MS Office. It is a bad analogy. I am confident that The GIMP could hold its own against a GPL'd older version of Photoshop. GIMP satisfies the needs of the majority of *nix users. Most of the people complaining about GIMP are professional graphic designers who would probably never run Linux anyway for reasons besides a lack of Photoshop. You probably couldn't get a lot of them to run Windows either without a fight even though the same version of Photoshop will run there.
Behave well in the X of the era when GIMP was first written or behave well in the typical X environment of today?
Dude, have you even used GIMP 2.0 on a GNOME desktop? Need I remind you that the libraries on which GNOME is based were pretty much invented by the GIMP developers?
but show me where developers are explicitly saying "I want you to use this software."
I can't. But you implied that they were when you said; "These people are working for free to give you software"
I implied no such thing.
Indeed it is - in the absence of any viable alternatives, as I've already pointed out.
Bullshit. The GIMP is a damn fine piece of software in its own right. Version 2.0 rocks. Maybe professional graphic artists are not going to be using it any time soon, but who'd expect them to? They are a very picky bunch who rarely venture away from their preferred OS, much less their preferred applications. Even if teh GIMP were technically superior to Photoshop, how many Mac users are going to install Linux? For the rest of us, GIMP rocks.
An old version of photoshop, released under the GPL and renamed would become the new OSS posterboy graphics manipulation app within a matter of months.
Bullshit again. You have no idea what a GPL'd version of Photoshop woudl be like. You have no idea how it might be crippled or limited. You have no idea what X toolkit it would use. Look at OpenOffice. That is one slow, bloated piece of crap that looks like hell and doesn't integrate into any common Linux desktop beccause it uses its own widgets and window management. Remember Wordperfect for Linux? Just because an application is good on one platform doesn't mean it will be good on another, GPL'd or not.
For all you know, The GIMP team would just take the useful bits from a GPL Photoshop to make GIMP that much better. It may be easier than trying to make Photoshop behave well in X. But of course, this is all speculation.
Yeah, notice the word "originally" in your own sentence. Do you read your own sentences? I'm sure Linus originally wrote programs that only displayed "hello world". But what's Linus doing now?
Trying to keep up with kernel patch submissions. He certainly isn't pushing LInux on the desktop for the masses. What did you think you caught me saying? Have you even read Linus interviews?
Yeah, that was kinda my point. It's open. You're saying "the developers aren't interested in..."
"...According to the stated goals of the project." Don't pretend I didn't qualify the statement. It is disengenous.
but you're talking about a lot of developers with a lot of different motivations.
I'm just saying that different motivations exist. YOu are asking me to speculate on them.
Yeah, and if it were true, as you suggest, that the GIMP developers are not interested in making a good and usable program, but were merely screwing around,
I said no such thing about the GIMP developers! I said that their stated target audience is limited (*nix users) despite the existence of a Windows port.
You seem to think that the point of OSS is, by default, a kind of masturbation for hobbyist geeks, which I believe is particularly the image it needs to shed.
It is what it is and doesn't "need" to shed any image. Use it or don't use it. ALl this crap about what developers spending their own time and energy "need" to do is pointless. That is what I think.
I'm never grateful for stuff I can't use and if they want me to use it they should be open to feedback from me.
Who is saying that they want you to use The GIMP? I know there are some people who think the GIMP is pretty neat and other's should try it, but show me where developers are explicitly saying "I want you to use this software."
Well, doh! Of course the users are complaining, and they're doing so legitimately too. The bottom line is this; Following your distinction, USERS (as opposed to developers) use the GIMP on Linux because there's no other realistic alternative. If,say, Adobe GPLed a linux version of Photoshop7, how many USERS do you think would continue using GIMP?
Depends on the implementation. Considering that PHotoshop is not native to X Windows, I'd guess that a Linux GPL'd version would be kinda sucky compared to GIMP. GIMP isn't great on Windows for that very reason. Believe it or not, many GIMP users actually prefer the GIMP for various reasons. Maybe they are not "serious" graphic artists, but they still prefer it. The GIMP is a pretty damn good piece of OSS despite teh criticism
And therein lies the rub. The famous desktop OSS applications (OpenOffice, Moz) either started life as commercial products or currently have / have had some form of commercial backing. So somewhere in those products life the devs have had to take USER feedback and that's why they're OSS poster boy apps now.
As pronobozo said: Open Source "Community" Are you really going to pretend to have the authority to spout this "If you don't like it, don't use it, but don't complain" stuff and then turn around and say, "But who ever said...?"
Sorry, I don't follow.
Yes. I am making a general argument. User feedback with worth paying attention to.
If one's goal is to make software that other people would want to use, yes. Otherwise, no. Linus Torvald's, for example, didn't originally set out to make something that anyone would want to use. He just wanted to learn i386 programming and OS design. He probably only cared what other programmers thought.
Yes, *nix has a small user base of people doing photo editing and graphic design. Perhaps they're happy with targeting *nix users, but don't rule out the possibility that they might want the *nix userbase to grow. Also don't rule out the possibility that they would like to make their software usable by a larger portion of the *nix userbase.
I'm only commenting on the stated goals that I am aware of. I won't speculate on the potential motives of every GIMP contributor.
A Windows or OS X port of The GIMP is little more than a side-effect of the GTK+ libraries being ported/portable.
I wouldn't tell that to the programmers who port it over.
Why not? It is common knowledge within the GIMP devlopment community, AFAIK.
Considering that The GIMP is targetted to *nix users, I doubt developers care much about Photoshop/Windows/Mac users.
Hmmmm.... so they don't want more people to use their program? They don't want the street-cred of professionals being wowed by their work? They aren't in favor of lending Linux credibility as a usable/professional platform by showing a high-quality design app that comes in the default install of most distros?
I have no clue, dude. I'm just going from the stated goal of that particular project. I can't speculate on every possible motive or every possible developer.
If that the case, then I hope someone branches it soon so that the developers can scratch their own itches in peace.
Insofar as it is GPL'd, anyone is free to fork the project.
OSS is "supposed to be" something that any number of geeks can tinker with unless otherwise stated.
That's all well and good except for the fact that it's *open*. Once you have a community and public contributers, what it's "supposed to be" gets opened up to those contributers and that community. No single person/group is in control, or isn't that the point? Especially so when you're dealing with something like the GIMP, where it's being distributed as the standard photo manipulation tool for many distros and DEs. I'd say that makes the GIMP fair game for criticism.
Sure, but there is constructive criticism and there is just pointless whining.
If they wanted their program to be their own little project without anyone complaining, here's an easy suggestion: don't distribute it. Don't GPL it. If you do, post it anonymously on some server and never touch it again. (But note I said *IF*! "If they wanted...")
Obviously anyone is free to criticize till they are blue in the face, but there is no implicit obligation for developers to listen to it just because they made the source public. I'm not saying people shouldn't criticize OSS. I'm just saying they shouldn't think less of the developer(s for not listening. The whole point of GPL'ing the source is to allow critics to put their money where their mouth is, so to speak.
No, the GIMP is no longer "something for geeks to tinker with", nor is Firefox or OOo or Gnome. They're pieces of software for users to use. They're pieces of software people depend on. And they are ambassadors for the community at large.
I'm sorry, but that is an unfair burden to put on OSS developers. They didn't sign up to be "ambassadors."
That's the type of interoperability people want. It's not complicated stuff, it's simply Copy&Paste functionality. If Linux figures the basics out, the stuff MacOS and Windows had sewn up in 1995, it'll rule the world.
I doubt it. Commercial entities will always prevail on the marketing side. Technically superior solutions are constantly being left in the dusk by the effect of bad marketing.
I don't really understand if that was sarcasm or what. Did I suggest that people should contribute to OSS but not use the software? There are people who find problems with software, submit a patch, but don't ultimately end up using it. Please clarify your statement. Were you being sarcastic?
And that's why OSS, in the state it is in today, will never be able to compete with commercial, user-friendly offerings. Thanks for proving my point for me.
If that was your point, then it was a really dumb point because OSS is competing more succesfully than ever before. No, it isn't taking the desktop by storm, but that isn't really relavent. If user-friendliness were the only factor, Apple would be way ahead of the game.
Slashdot Mirror
You, apparently.
I think this is something that is definitely changing but I do not believe that man has anything to do with it.
You are certainly free to believe whatever you want, but it doesn't necessarily have any bearing on reality.
-matthew
Sure, but "respectable" back then meant "not contradicting the church." Recognition of global warming is the modern equivalent of recognizing that the Earth does, in fact, revolve around the sun.
If it's so readily apparent, why can't I see it where I live? You want to prove global warming is happening, then provide the proof. Don't expect me to go looking for something I don't think is there. The burden of proof lies with you, my friend.
That is like saying, "if the Earth really does revolve around the sun, why can't I see it where I live without a telescope? Don't expect me to go looking for a heliocentric solar system that I don't think is there." If you are not willing to look at the evidence outside your own little world, don't even bother commenting on the subject of global warming.
-matthew
Why is it that, on one hand, we hear from Kyoto detractors that Kyoto is a "joke" and then the same people recognize how much of a sacrafice we'd have to make to obey it. Seems to me that it is not, in fact, a joke. Rather, it is something very serious. It is a start.
Keep in mind that most of the US lives much, much more sparsely than Europeans. They are not (for the most part) crowded into dense polluted cities.
WHile it might be true that US citizens are less densley packed than Europeans, the majority of Americans live in metropolitan areas and not in rural areas. Also, European cities, with the exception of Paris, seem much cleaner than most American cities. Maybe there is some major underlying polution that I am just not aware of, but as far as I can tell, they are pretty darn clean compared to New York, Chicago, Detroit, LA, etc.
Despite the dire claims, we have yet to see any REAL environmental disaster.
And we probably won't see a singular disaster. The environment has been, and will continue to be in gradual decline as underground water tables dwindle, atmospheric CO2 rises, rainforests get slashed and burned, etc, etc etc. Just because many people (including you, apparently) have misinterpretted the warnings as pronouncements of imminent doom, doens't mean they are invalid.
The air and water seem pretty good. Weather seems normal.
In post-industrial nations, yes. This is largely true. But guess why it is this way. Because of environmentalists making a fuss about it. Although the air and water could be cleaner. We still have work to do. Why is it that I shouldn't eat fish out of Lake Michigan or the Mississppi River? These are major fresh water ways and we woudln't be wise to eat or drink directly from them. Everyone knows these water ways are full of pollution.
Kyoto WOULD create a nasty economic downturn. Everyone over 30 can remember the last one, and it wasn't pretty. Worse, the Kyoto downturn would be PERMANENT.
Gee, talk about doom and gloom. Economic disaster is right around the corner if we enact stricter environmental standards! Oh no! Permanent Great Depression ahead! Whatever you do, don't act in an environmentally responsible manner! What you don't seem to realize is that the economy survived the major environmental regulations of the 70's. Our cars are MUCH cleaner. It was tough, but we did it. We are all better off for it. But we can't stop now. THere are many more improvements to be made.
I seem to recall a time in history when industry leaders insisted that if we enact child labor laws, the economy would suffer horribly and permanently. BUt here we are today with our children enjoying their childhoods without needing to work for peanuts in sweatshops. Yeah, maybe some industries found it difficult at first to get by without cheap child labor. It was the same way with slavery in the South. Southerners felt that slavery was necessary for economic survival. But eventually it worked out. And we are better off for it. The environment is very much the same, IMO. Environmentalists are the modern day abolitionists even if they do lack some of the moral imperitive.
-matthew
Too bad we weren't honest enough to stay out of that silly Geneva Convention thing. ;-)
-matthew
No, but they could at least try to come up with something meaningful to say. Nobody but a manager really knows what becoming "more customer focused" really means. What a mmanager might say is something like "stop making silly, mocking faces while talking to customers on the phone and don't assume they are morons." But then again, maybe scolding employees isn't the best motivating force.
-matthew
Isn't this enough to justify its existence? :)
There are plenty of other forms of communication online now.
But none that compare to usenet in scope and function. The NNTP protocol may be replaced, but the functionality that usenet as a whole provides will not disappear. Enough people still want a global, public forum system with a choice in user interfaces. Isolated web forums with crappy, proprietary interfaces don't cut it. Usenet, like Email, allows me as a user to chose whatever reader I want. I can't do that with web forums. I am stuck with their choice of web interface.
The Internet has been slowly moving away from generalised, one-size-(doesn't)-fit-all forms of communication segregated forms classified according to interests and comparitive levels of mental health, among other things. That also is exactly how it ought to be. I'm not saying that I believe any particular group should not be allowed to exist...all should, and all generally serve a purpose. What I *have* always been a very firm believer in however is voluntary segregation. It works, and it's better for everyone concerned.
Really, i think you have it backwards. The Internet, pretty much by definiton, is a combining of disparate and segregated networks and services into generalized and standardized formats. Email (SMTP), Web (HTTP/HTML), etc. What you are suggesting is that we go BACK to the time when we had distinct information services such as private BBS, AOL, Compuserve, Prodigy, university networks, etc. All of which required voluntary membership to. All of which had varying level of mental health among users... everthing you describe. It worked, but the trend is to move away from such a model and to generalized "one-size-fits-all" model. USENET was one of the earliest attempts at this. While it might be aging as a technology, it is part of the larger trend of the Internet to move away from segregation.
-matthew
So basically what you are saying is that web forums don't really offer more "features" than usenet. They're simply different beasts that serve different purposes (generally).
-matthew
How far is the wind goign to blow something as dense as uranium compounds?
-matthew
I'm sure there are plenty of slashdotters who understand the correct labels for the various developmental disorders. These same people might also have some knowledge of good software for different disabilities. These are the people who should be answering the question. People who don't know the correct "labels" aren't going to know the correct software.
-matthew
Huh? I didn't say slashdotters shouldn't be asked the question. I suggested that the information provided is not adaquate for giving a worthwhile answer and that anyone who is satisified with "he can't read or write" is certainly not going to give a worthwhle answer. Whether or not more information should involve a DSM diagnosis is irrelevant at this point (although it would help). This guy obviously has some serious disabilities that need to be specifically addressed. There is a big difference between autism and down syndrome, for example. You can't treat them the same.
-matthew
If "he can't read or write well" is adaquate, then Slashdot was the wrong place to ask the question.
I actually do have some familiarity with the DSM having had my own mental abberations submitted to its Procrustean taxonomy. I'm tempted to make some critical comments, but life's too short. Suffice to say that the headshrinkers I most respect consider it useful for finding appropriate rituals to appease the Insurance Gods, nothing more.
Be that as it may, you can't ignore the value of knowing the nature of an individual's problems before giving any worthwhile advice. "He can't read or write well" just doesn't cut it.
-matthew
-matthew
You'd have to be an idiot to not believe in science (that it exists and makes valid and useful discoveries). Science with a capital S is something else entirely, though. It woudl seem to imply some kind of religion or life philosophy... and only an idiot would believe in it.
-matthew
Isn't that what are bodies are already doing as we speak? There is a constant battle going on that you are not aware of. If this new HIV variant is otherwise inert, I don't see any problem using it to attack cancer cells. Although it would kinda suck to find that the HIV stuck around even after its job was done. Eventually everone would have it.
-matthew
Ok, then it is the other person who seems to think that "freely given" implies "expects me to use." Use it or don't use it. There is no implicit expectation.
The same users who have issues which you think shouldn't to be addressed, no doubt.
I didn't say anything "shouldn't be addressed." I just think that saying "developer egos conflict with standards" is not constructive criticism and fails to take into account the target audience of the GIMP and what GIMP has already contributed to current standards in OSS, namely, GTK+.
Here's a slice of the inkscape FAQ:"inkscape was founded in 2003 by four Sodipodi developers with the mission of creating a fully compliant SVG drawing tool written in C++ with a new, HIG-compliant interface"
Of course, anyone is free to fork GIMP and make it fully compliant with a GNOME desktop environment. It already uses the appropriate X toolkit, which is most of the battle, so it shouldn't be that difficult. Yet I don't see anyone doing it. It would seem as though the people who use or would use GIMP are sufficiently satisfied with the way it functions on a modern Linux desktop. This may change. And when it does, it does. That is the way OSS works.
-matthew
It is "given" only in that it is freely available. Use it or don't use it. There is no expectation except maybe in your own mind.
Yes but it's [OOo] still the Great White Hope of OSS office software isn't it?
As direct competition for MS Office, perhaps. But usable alternatives do exist. Personally, I wouldn't use any Linux application that compared directly to MS OFfice. I wouldn't use MS Office. I simply do not need 80% of the functionality.
A photoshop port may also suffer the same disadvantages, but be sufficiently tooled and usable in a way that's acceptable to the majority of users, that it would do to GIMP what OOo has done to Abisuite, the original Gnome Office , KOffice and yes, Wordperfect for Linux (which was an old style X/*nix app - just like GIMP)
The current incarnation of The GIMP is far more complete and functional compared to Photoshop than Abisuite or KOffice are compared to MS Office. It is a bad analogy. I am confident that The GIMP could hold its own against a GPL'd older version of Photoshop. GIMP satisfies the needs of the majority of *nix users. Most of the people complaining about GIMP are professional graphic designers who would probably never run Linux anyway for reasons besides a lack of Photoshop. You probably couldn't get a lot of them to run Windows either without a fight even though the same version of Photoshop will run there.
Behave well in the X of the era when GIMP was first written or behave well in the typical X environment of today?
Dude, have you even used GIMP 2.0 on a GNOME desktop? Need I remind you that the libraries on which GNOME is based were pretty much invented by the GIMP developers?
-matthew
I can't. But you implied that they were when you said; "These people are working for free to give you software"
I implied no such thing.
Indeed it is - in the absence of any viable alternatives, as I've already pointed out.
Bullshit. The GIMP is a damn fine piece of software in its own right. Version 2.0 rocks. Maybe professional graphic artists are not going to be using it any time soon, but who'd expect them to? They are a very picky bunch who rarely venture away from their preferred OS, much less their preferred applications. Even if teh GIMP were technically superior to Photoshop, how many Mac users are going to install Linux? For the rest of us, GIMP rocks.
An old version of photoshop, released under the GPL and renamed would become the new OSS posterboy graphics manipulation app within a matter of months.
Bullshit again. You have no idea what a GPL'd version of Photoshop woudl be like. You have no idea how it might be crippled or limited. You have no idea what X toolkit it would use. Look at OpenOffice. That is one slow, bloated piece of crap that looks like hell and doesn't integrate into any common Linux desktop beccause it uses its own widgets and window management. Remember Wordperfect for Linux? Just because an application is good on one platform doesn't mean it will be good on another, GPL'd or not.
For all you know, The GIMP team would just take the useful bits from a GPL Photoshop to make GIMP that much better. It may be easier than trying to make Photoshop behave well in X. But of course, this is all speculation.
-matthew
Trying to keep up with kernel patch submissions. He certainly isn't pushing LInux on the desktop for the masses. What did you think you caught me saying? Have you even read Linus interviews?
Yeah, that was kinda my point. It's open. You're saying "the developers aren't interested in..."
"...According to the stated goals of the project." Don't pretend I didn't qualify the statement. It is disengenous.
but you're talking about a lot of developers with a lot of different motivations.
I'm just saying that different motivations exist. YOu are asking me to speculate on them.
Yeah, and if it were true, as you suggest, that the GIMP developers are not interested in making a good and usable program, but were merely screwing around,
I said no such thing about the GIMP developers! I said that their stated target audience is limited (*nix users) despite the existence of a Windows port.
You seem to think that the point of OSS is, by default, a kind of masturbation for hobbyist geeks, which I believe is particularly the image it needs to shed.
It is what it is and doesn't "need" to shed any image. Use it or don't use it. ALl this crap about what developers spending their own time and energy "need" to do is pointless. That is what I think.
-matthew
I don't care. It does what I need it to do. I've been using Linux exclusively on the desktop (at home and work) for 8 years now.
-matthew
Who is saying that they want you to use The GIMP? I know there are some people who think the GIMP is pretty neat and other's should try it, but show me where developers are explicitly saying "I want you to use this software."
Well, doh! Of course the users are complaining, and they're doing so legitimately too. The bottom line is this; Following your distinction, USERS (as opposed to developers) use the GIMP on Linux because there's no other realistic alternative. If ,say, Adobe GPLed a linux version of Photoshop7, how many USERS do you think would continue using GIMP?
Depends on the implementation. Considering that PHotoshop is not native to X Windows, I'd guess that a Linux GPL'd version would be kinda sucky compared to GIMP. GIMP isn't great on Windows for that very reason. Believe it or not, many GIMP users actually prefer the GIMP for various reasons. Maybe they are not "serious" graphic artists, but they still prefer it. The GIMP is a pretty damn good piece of OSS despite teh criticism
And therein lies the rub. The famous desktop OSS applications (OpenOffice, Moz) either started life as commercial products or currently have / have had some form of commercial backing. So somewhere in those products life the devs have had to take USER feedback and that's why they're OSS poster boy apps now.
The GIMP is also a posterboy app for OSS.
-matthew
Sorry, I don't follow.
Yes. I am making a general argument. User feedback with worth paying attention to.
If one's goal is to make software that other people would want to use, yes. Otherwise, no. Linus Torvald's, for example, didn't originally set out to make something that anyone would want to use. He just wanted to learn i386 programming and OS design. He probably only cared what other programmers thought.
Yes, *nix has a small user base of people doing photo editing and graphic design. Perhaps they're happy with targeting *nix users, but don't rule out the possibility that they might want the *nix userbase to grow. Also don't rule out the possibility that they would like to make their software usable by a larger portion of the *nix userbase.
I'm only commenting on the stated goals that I am aware of. I won't speculate on the potential motives of every GIMP contributor.
A Windows or OS X port of The GIMP is little more than a side-effect of the GTK+ libraries being ported/portable.
I wouldn't tell that to the programmers who port it over.
Why not? It is common knowledge within the GIMP devlopment community, AFAIK.
Considering that The GIMP is targetted to *nix users, I doubt developers care much about Photoshop/Windows/Mac users.
Hmmmm.... so they don't want more people to use their program? They don't want the street-cred of professionals being wowed by their work? They aren't in favor of lending Linux credibility as a usable/professional platform by showing a high-quality design app that comes in the default install of most distros?
I have no clue, dude. I'm just going from the stated goal of that particular project. I can't speculate on every possible motive or every possible developer.
If that the case, then I hope someone branches it soon so that the developers can scratch their own itches in peace.
Insofar as it is GPL'd, anyone is free to fork the project.
OSS is "supposed to be" something that any number of geeks can tinker with unless otherwise stated.
That's all well and good except for the fact that it's *open*. Once you have a community and public contributers, what it's "supposed to be" gets opened up to those contributers and that community. No single person/group is in control, or isn't that the point? Especially so when you're dealing with something like the GIMP, where it's being distributed as the standard photo manipulation tool for many distros and DEs. I'd say that makes the GIMP fair game for criticism.
Sure, but there is constructive criticism and there is just pointless whining.
If they wanted their program to be their own little project without anyone complaining, here's an easy suggestion: don't distribute it. Don't GPL it. If you do, post it anonymously on some server and never touch it again. (But note I said *IF*! "If they wanted...")
Obviously anyone is free to criticize till they are blue in the face, but there is no implicit obligation for developers to listen to it just because they made the source public. I'm not saying people shouldn't criticize OSS. I'm just saying they shouldn't think less of the developer(s for not listening. The whole point of GPL'ing the source is to allow critics to put their money where their mouth is, so to speak.
No, the GIMP is no longer "something for geeks to tinker with", nor is Firefox or OOo or Gnome. They're pieces of software for users to use. They're pieces of software people depend on. And they are ambassadors for the community at large.
I'm sorry, but that is an unfair burden to put on OSS developers. They didn't sign up to be "ambassadors."
GUY1: I suggest so
I doubt it. Commercial entities will always prevail on the marketing side. Technically superior solutions are constantly being left in the dusk by the effect of bad marketing.
-matthew
I don't really understand if that was sarcasm or what. Did I suggest that people should contribute to OSS but not use the software? There are people who find problems with software, submit a patch, but don't ultimately end up using it. Please clarify your statement. Were you being sarcastic?
-matthew
If that was your point, then it was a really dumb point because OSS is competing more succesfully than ever before. No, it isn't taking the desktop by storm, but that isn't really relavent. If user-friendliness were the only factor, Apple would be way ahead of the game.
-matthew
Then I should have said, "if you don't like an OSS project, either contribute OR don't use it."
-matthew