"I mean why would they voluntarily add this feature? It makes you wonder if anyone was pushing their buttons about it... "
Photoshop is quite often used to alter images. You can make just about any image in Photoshop, and do it convincingly. I am not the least bit surprised nor concerned that Adobe's gone this way.
It is NOT going to reach out into porn, or other forms of censorship, so put your damn pitchforks down.
(Note: That last comment was not directed at Michaeltoe. I just can't believe the unrealistic extremes people are concerned about)
I didn't congratulate anybody. I said the administrator isn't at fault. Just because it was in his power to prevent it doesn't mean he's at fault when somebody causes mischief with it.
I agree with you about the teaching part, though I disagree with what you said about him not being taught anything. He is being taught something: Be disruptive, be suspended. This rule wasn't just recently enacted. Heck, I was suspended once for blowing a referee style whistle in the halls. Is the store at fault for selling it to me?
Is there a forum or something for Gimp where I can provide my input on its UI? I cannot provide programming assistance, but I can provide useful insight into making it friendlier to artists.
I have, and its mail client is horrible to the point of being unusable. Outlook runs circles around it.
People take pokes at Outlook all the time (although I think they typically mean Outlook Express without realizing that Office's Outlook exists...) but Microsoft got the interface right. It is very easy to organize your mail, plus automate it to do a lot of the work for you. I've yet to see a mail client approach that level of usability.
"Really? I'm a bit out-of-date on Photoshop, but IIRC GIMP has all the layer modes that Photoshop did back when I was admining a lab of Photoshop machines (which was, admittedly, back in the day...)"
It wasn't even up to what version 5 had of Photoshop, and that's going back a couple of years. When 7 came out, they added a bunch more.
"True, but Photoshop would then suck in a multi-windowed environment. It drives me up a wall that the X11 version of Opera can't do multiple windows -- that you're stuck with MDI and a single desktop."
Opera cannot open multiple windows on Linux? Oh that sucks, it does work in the Windows version. And yes, you are right about Photoshop and the multi-windowed environment. You can only open one instance of Photoshop, and that drives me NUTS sometimes.
"This used to be more epidemic than it once was. A few plugins still do not have it -- the Gaussian blur plugins lack it. This is actually on my to-do list.:-)"
Ah. Well now I kinda feel bad. I hope you're not personally insulted by my comments. If you got the idea that I'm against ever using Gimp, then I apologize. I think it's a cool project. I look forward to its future. One thing that drives me nuts about Photoshop is that if you're not already in the industry, it is hard to pony up $600 for it. (I got lucky, my first copy was on a student discount, but still hard to afford.) Gimp provides a free alternative that is quite refreshing, and it may even displace Photoshop down the road. Imagine being 18, not having a job, still living with the parents, yet developing artistic skills that get your foot in the door.
"Mmmf. I can see how this might be annoying on other platforms -- in a traditional X11 environment, it's par for the course, and most folks comfortable with X11 apps are pretty happy."
I used Gimp in Linux before using it on Windows. I was happy too. It wasn't until I used it on my personal Windows 2k machine that it irk'd me.
"I don't run into accidental clicks outside of windows, though."
Yeah, well it still happens. I do a lot of testing where I work now, and I have to be mindful of accidental situations. Fortunately this isn't a devastating case, just a minor annoyance.
"Sure, but you do print work, right?"
I primarily work in 3D, but I'm also my company's only artist. As such, I do find myself doing print work from time to time. So yes I do, but not often enough to stay on top of what Gimp has to offer.
"For folks that only do digital output, it's not such a big deal -- GIMP does have a few lacks, but it works pretty well for digital output. "
Oh I agree. As I mentioned before, I'm excited about it's future. But right now, with a fully licensed Photoshop in my lap, it's really hard to switch to. I will say, though, that FilmGimp's use of >8bit per channel imagery is QUITE attractive lately. It's on my list of 'things to go play with'.
Counter bullshit: During game commercials, you can very clearly see, even in the brief half second clips of a game, the ugly artifacts brought up by this limitation of the hardware.
" can compare an Atari 2600 to whatever modern computer you want and the graphics on the computer will be superior - even though that computer wasn't built with gaming in mind [we'll say it was assembled to be a web server.] You see the trouble with your rationale?"
No, not really. Don't get me wrong, I see what you're saying, but it doesn't prove my statement is 'weak at best'. If the result is that it does what people buy it to do, it's hard to take the "it's not designed with gaming in mind" very seriously. Games are about the result, not the journey getting there. XBOX's could be sold with vaccuum tubes in the hardware, if it still produces pleasing results, then why is that statement very relevant?
Just so you know, I *am* listening, so please don't feel the need to put me in my place. I'd much rather have a thoughtful discussion here than an argument.
"If Apple is so pro-open source, when are they going to add Ogg Vorbis to the iPod? "
Does the iPod have the processing power to do it? It is my understanding that OGG requires more operations to decode. Corrections invited.
In any case, what's the point of cramming it in there if the general populace isn't even aware of its existence? It's one more thing to support, and doesn't guarantee a whole lot more people are going to buy iPods. From a business point of view, it's pretty cleary why they're not jumping on it.
"Sega then ships the Dreamcast a whole year before the PS2, and gets trounced once again."
Niether of your Sega references really support the 'first != advantage argument'. In the case of the Saturn, they took too many shortcuts to get it out to market first. Sega simply didn't have all the pieces in place and tripped themselves up in the process. Sony, on the other hand, had a complete system with games that demonstrated its power. If the Saturn had been more like the PS in both power and game library at launch, the possibility is strong that Sony would have bitten it.
Then, there's the Dreamcast. Sony had a nice little hype wave going, but it's not clear that Sega was really trounced. Just when they were getting into the thick of it, financial concerns forced them to back out. They had a respectable number of machines out there, they had some cool games coming, and the graphics on the system were noticably clearer. (The PS2 has a RAM bottleneck in the video system, the result is blurry graphics.) If Sega was able to keep that system going, it may not have been #2, but it easily would be ahead of the GC and XBOX by a long shot.
" But wasn't Dreamcast considered part of this generation? I believe it was a 128-bit system and its capabilities whipped the pants off of PS1 and N64. "
The Dreamcast didn't die because people didn't want it, it died because Sega couldn't move enough units to stay afloat. The difference may seem subtle at first, but think about it a sec: You have to build the machines before selling them. If you're trying to be competitive with other over-hyped systems, you're being forced to cut too many corners. Eventually it just wasn't profitable enough in the short term for them. Many people weeped over the demise of that system, it wasn't because it was neglected.
On a side note: Side by side, Dreamcast games looked better than PS2 games. The PS2, though technically more powerful, has a nasty little RAM bottleneck that forces them to render at half screen, and interpoplate back up to full screen. The RAM saved was put into textures etc. The DC, however, had an adequate buffer to do full-res video. The result? Clarity. That thing could move textures like mad.
Pity Sony had to be so arrogant with their design. Lots of hardship on the developers in that aspect. I remember the Oddworld game was moved to the XBOX because the PS2 was too limiting on the artists.
"Say what you will about the XBox OS, it's hardware and interfaces were not originally developed with gaming in mind."
Seeing as how the XBOX is much more impressive graphically than the PS2, it's hard to take the 'not originally developed with gaming in mind' comment too seriously.
"Besides they have already mentioned the device they will reveal at the E3 wont be a handheld or a console"
That doesn't rule out a portable Game Cube. It could be as simple as a GC with a built in screen. The BFD you ask? Imagine a GameCube Lan party where you only bring this tiny box and a network hub.
* Nowhere near as many layer modes. Photoshop is more like working in a darkroom, whereas Gimp is more like working with the features of a consumer level digital camera. That bit me in the ass while trying to show my coworker how to make a seamless texture for a 3D project he's working on.
* Gimp thinks it needs to have seperate windows on the taskbar. This is useful on a multi-desktop environment like KDE where you can just dedicate a desktop to it, but in the single desktop environment like Windows, it's a PITA to have 5 extra windows open. Photoshop's MDI environment is much better in that respect. (Why not use the equivalent of Mozilla's tabbed browsing?)
* It's been mentioned before that Gimp doesn't support CMYK. Corrections invited.
* One of the filters I tried to show my coworker didn't have a preview mode. (It was either blur or a sharpen filter I think...) I've read that earlier versions of Gimp had no preview modes to speak of in any of the features, but that may have been fixed in recent months. I can tell you that as of a week or two ago, we ended up having to use trial and error to figure out the right number to plug in to a filter.
* This is related to my taskbar complaint, but a nicely contained problem all on it's own. Since there's no 'background window' to Gimp, be careful about running it with other apps on the same desktop. Otherwise an accidental click will bring a background window to front. Obnoxious. Simple fix really. Set up a background window, and when it comes to focus, bring up the other related windows. Don't want that? set up a switch to turn it off.
I'm sure there'll be rebuttals to my points. Frankly, I don't see the point. Gimp has the potential to be on the same level as Photoshop. That day has to arrive before I dump Photoshop. Sorry. I've got work to do.
"RTFA. This is not a brute-force attack. It's an inherent dumbness of their password scheme."
That doesn't, in any way, refute his point. He was saying that you cannot practically secure a document like this. Microsoft wasn't even aiming to do that. It's more like the FBI Warning at the beginning of a movie than a padlock.
I got $.50 that says Microsoft goes after Security Focus via DMCA. If that day comes, don't pretend to act surprised. It ain't right, but it's happened before elsewhere.
Personally, I think it's a stupid argument, but that's the one the open source zealots make. "
Oh, I see what you mean. I agree, it's a very overrated argument. Even if Photoshop did have its source code available, I don't know a single person who'd actually look at the source code. We want to get our work done, not tweak.
Slashdot Mirror
Didn't realize I had a fan.
"No. People may have valid reasons to post as AC."
Never said kill it all together, I said kill it until the crapflood dies.
"I mean why would they voluntarily add this feature? It makes you wonder if anyone was pushing their buttons about it... "
Photoshop is quite often used to alter images. You can make just about any image in Photoshop, and do it convincingly. I am not the least bit surprised nor concerned that Adobe's gone this way.
It is NOT going to reach out into porn, or other forms of censorship, so put your damn pitchforks down.
(Note: That last comment was not directed at Michaeltoe. I just can't believe the unrealistic extremes people are concerned about)
"If you don't like it, don't use it. "
If you don't like that Word's password format is hackable, use Notepad.
'moderators are there to mod down crap floods.'
No, moderators are there to mod UP the interesting posts. If you spend your mod points on the flood, you're doing exactly what the trolls want.
Frankly, Slashdot should just disable anonymous posting until it subsides.
Yes, that is a fair and true statement.
Sony did an excellent job with the PS2, and I'm sure the owners are quite happy.
I didn't congratulate anybody. I said the administrator isn't at fault. Just because it was in his power to prevent it doesn't mean he's at fault when somebody causes mischief with it.
I agree with you about the teaching part, though I disagree with what you said about him not being taught anything. He is being taught something: Be disruptive, be suspended. This rule wasn't just recently enacted. Heck, I was suspended once for blowing a referee style whistle in the halls. Is the store at fault for selling it to me?
"I've been crossing my eyes at Nasa's Mars photos for half an hour and I still can't see a beagle!"
Dupe.
On the plus side, though, you're well on your way to becoming a Slashdot editor.
Sorry, meant to ask this in my previous post:
Is there a forum or something for Gimp where I can provide my input on its UI? I cannot provide programming assistance, but I can provide useful insight into making it friendlier to artists.
I have, and its mail client is horrible to the point of being unusable. Outlook runs circles around it.
People take pokes at Outlook all the time (although I think they typically mean Outlook Express without realizing that Office's Outlook exists...) but Microsoft got the interface right. It is very easy to organize your mail, plus automate it to do a lot of the work for you. I've yet to see a mail client approach that level of usability.
"Really? I'm a bit out-of-date on Photoshop, but IIRC GIMP has all the layer modes that Photoshop did back when I was admining a lab of Photoshop machines (which was, admittedly, back in the day...)"
:-)"
It wasn't even up to what version 5 had of Photoshop, and that's going back a couple of years. When 7 came out, they added a bunch more.
"True, but Photoshop would then suck in a multi-windowed environment. It drives me up a wall that the X11 version of Opera can't do multiple windows -- that you're stuck with MDI and a single desktop."
Opera cannot open multiple windows on Linux? Oh that sucks, it does work in the Windows version. And yes, you are right about Photoshop and the multi-windowed environment. You can only open one instance of Photoshop, and that drives me NUTS sometimes.
"This used to be more epidemic than it once was. A few plugins still do not have it -- the Gaussian blur plugins lack it. This is actually on my to-do list.
Ah. Well now I kinda feel bad. I hope you're not personally insulted by my comments. If you got the idea that I'm against ever using Gimp, then I apologize. I think it's a cool project. I look forward to its future. One thing that drives me nuts about Photoshop is that if you're not already in the industry, it is hard to pony up $600 for it. (I got lucky, my first copy was on a student discount, but still hard to afford.) Gimp provides a free alternative that is quite refreshing, and it may even displace Photoshop down the road. Imagine being 18, not having a job, still living with the parents, yet developing artistic skills that get your foot in the door.
"Mmmf. I can see how this might be annoying on other platforms -- in a traditional X11 environment, it's par for the course, and most folks comfortable with X11 apps are pretty happy."
I used Gimp in Linux before using it on Windows. I was happy too. It wasn't until I used it on my personal Windows 2k machine that it irk'd me.
"I don't run into accidental clicks outside of windows, though."
Yeah, well it still happens. I do a lot of testing where I work now, and I have to be mindful of accidental situations. Fortunately this isn't a devastating case, just a minor annoyance.
"Sure, but you do print work, right?"
I primarily work in 3D, but I'm also my company's only artist. As such, I do find myself doing print work from time to time. So yes I do, but not often enough to stay on top of what Gimp has to offer.
"For folks that only do digital output, it's not such a big deal -- GIMP does have a few lacks, but it works pretty well for digital output. "
Oh I agree. As I mentioned before, I'm excited about it's future. But right now, with a fully licensed Photoshop in my lap, it's really hard to switch to. I will say, though, that FilmGimp's use of >8bit per channel imagery is QUITE attractive lately. It's on my list of 'things to go play with'.
Counter bullshit: During game commercials, you can very clearly see, even in the brief half second clips of a game, the ugly artifacts brought up by this limitation of the hardware.
" can compare an Atari 2600 to whatever modern computer you want and the graphics on the computer will be superior - even though that computer wasn't built with gaming in mind [we'll say it was assembled to be a web server.] You see the trouble with your rationale?"
No, not really. Don't get me wrong, I see what you're saying, but it doesn't prove my statement is 'weak at best'. If the result is that it does what people buy it to do, it's hard to take the "it's not designed with gaming in mind" very seriously. Games are about the result, not the journey getting there. XBOX's could be sold with vaccuum tubes in the hardware, if it still produces pleasing results, then why is that statement very relevant?
Just so you know, I *am* listening, so please don't feel the need to put me in my place. I'd much rather have a thoughtful discussion here than an argument.
"If Apple is so pro-open source, when are they going to add Ogg Vorbis to the iPod? "
Does the iPod have the processing power to do it? It is my understanding that OGG requires more operations to decode. Corrections invited.
In any case, what's the point of cramming it in there if the general populace isn't even aware of its existence? It's one more thing to support, and doesn't guarantee a whole lot more people are going to buy iPods. From a business point of view, it's pretty cleary why they're not jumping on it.
Sorry, I meant #1, not #2. Too used to jumping to Nintendo's defense there. ;)
"No, the PS2 has a lowly (480MHz!) 32-bit RISC-based (R3000?) CPU at it's heart. So pedestrian."
No, it has a lowly 300mhz processor.
"Sega then ships the Dreamcast a whole year before the PS2, and gets trounced once again."
Niether of your Sega references really support the 'first != advantage argument'. In the case of the Saturn, they took too many shortcuts to get it out to market first. Sega simply didn't have all the pieces in place and tripped themselves up in the process. Sony, on the other hand, had a complete system with games that demonstrated its power. If the Saturn had been more like the PS in both power and game library at launch, the possibility is strong that Sony would have bitten it.
Then, there's the Dreamcast. Sony had a nice little hype wave going, but it's not clear that Sega was really trounced. Just when they were getting into the thick of it, financial concerns forced them to back out. They had a respectable number of machines out there, they had some cool games coming, and the graphics on the system were noticably clearer. (The PS2 has a RAM bottleneck in the video system, the result is blurry graphics.) If Sega was able to keep that system going, it may not have been #2, but it easily would be ahead of the GC and XBOX by a long shot.
" But wasn't Dreamcast considered part of this generation? I believe it was a 128-bit system and its capabilities whipped the pants off of PS1 and N64. "
The Dreamcast didn't die because people didn't want it, it died because Sega couldn't move enough units to stay afloat. The difference may seem subtle at first, but think about it a sec: You have to build the machines before selling them. If you're trying to be competitive with other over-hyped systems, you're being forced to cut too many corners. Eventually it just wasn't profitable enough in the short term for them. Many people weeped over the demise of that system, it wasn't because it was neglected.
On a side note: Side by side, Dreamcast games looked better than PS2 games. The PS2, though technically more powerful, has a nasty little RAM bottleneck that forces them to render at half screen, and interpoplate back up to full screen. The RAM saved was put into textures etc. The DC, however, had an adequate buffer to do full-res video. The result? Clarity. That thing could move textures like mad.
Pity Sony had to be so arrogant with their design. Lots of hardship on the developers in that aspect. I remember the Oddworld game was moved to the XBOX because the PS2 was too limiting on the artists.
"Say what you will about the XBox OS, it's hardware and interfaces were not originally developed with gaming in mind."
Seeing as how the XBOX is much more impressive graphically than the PS2, it's hard to take the 'not originally developed with gaming in mind' comment too seriously.
"Besides they have already mentioned the device they will reveal at the E3 wont be a handheld or a console"
That doesn't rule out a portable Game Cube. It could be as simple as a GC with a built in screen. The BFD you ask? Imagine a GameCube Lan party where you only bring this tiny box and a network hub.
Just adding to your list here:
* Nowhere near as many layer modes. Photoshop is more like working in a darkroom, whereas Gimp is more like working with the features of a consumer level digital camera. That bit me in the ass while trying to show my coworker how to make a seamless texture for a 3D project he's working on.
* Gimp thinks it needs to have seperate windows on the taskbar. This is useful on a multi-desktop environment like KDE where you can just dedicate a desktop to it, but in the single desktop environment like Windows, it's a PITA to have 5 extra windows open. Photoshop's MDI environment is much better in that respect. (Why not use the equivalent of Mozilla's tabbed browsing?)
* It's been mentioned before that Gimp doesn't support CMYK. Corrections invited.
* One of the filters I tried to show my coworker didn't have a preview mode. (It was either blur or a sharpen filter I think...) I've read that earlier versions of Gimp had no preview modes to speak of in any of the features, but that may have been fixed in recent months. I can tell you that as of a week or two ago, we ended up having to use trial and error to figure out the right number to plug in to a filter.
* This is related to my taskbar complaint, but a nicely contained problem all on it's own. Since there's no 'background window' to Gimp, be careful about running it with other apps on the same desktop. Otherwise an accidental click will bring a background window to front. Obnoxious. Simple fix really. Set up a background window, and when it comes to focus, bring up the other related windows. Don't want that? set up a switch to turn it off.
I'm sure there'll be rebuttals to my points. Frankly, I don't see the point. Gimp has the potential to be on the same level as Photoshop. That day has to arrive before I dump Photoshop. Sorry. I've got work to do.
"You'd best save that $.50 for the bus ride back to Idiotville. "
I'll buy you a beer when I get there.
"RTFA. This is not a brute-force attack. It's an inherent dumbness of their password scheme."
That doesn't, in any way, refute his point. He was saying that you cannot practically secure a document like this. Microsoft wasn't even aiming to do that. It's more like the FBI Warning at the beginning of a movie than a padlock.
I got $.50 that says Microsoft goes after Security Focus via DMCA. If that day comes, don't pretend to act surprised. It ain't right, but it's happened before elsewhere.
"Elaboration: I can't look at the source code.
Personally, I think it's a stupid argument, but that's the one the open source zealots make. "
Oh, I see what you mean. I agree, it's a very overrated argument. Even if Photoshop did have its source code available, I don't know a single person who'd actually look at the source code. We want to get our work done, not tweak.