GIMP Core Mostly Ported to GEGL 312
A longstanding task for the GIMP has been porting the core graphics code from the ancient implementation (dating back to version 1.2) to GEGL. Progress has been hampered by the amount of code relying on details of the implementation of image data: tiles are directly accessed instead of linear buffers, and changing that detail would break the entire core and all plugins. A few weeks ago, two GIMP hackers got together to do some general hacking, and inadvertedly ported the core graphics code to GEGL. They work around the mismatch between GEGL buffers and GIMP tiles by implementing a storage backend for GEGL using the legacy GIMP tiles; to their surprise things Just Worked (tm), and their code branch will become the 2.9 development series once 2.8 is released. With this, 2.10 will finally feature higher bit depth images, additional color spaces (CMYK for one), and hardware accelerated image operations. There's still work to be done: to take advantage of the new features, plugins need to be ported to access GEGL buffers instead of GIMP tiles, but the conversion work is straightforward and current plugins will continue working as well as they do now in the meantime.
Inadvertently... (Score:5, Funny)
A few weeks ago, two GIMP hackers got together to do some general hacking, and inadvertedly ported the core graphics code to GEGL.
Is it just me, or does that not pretty much sum up GIMP development since day one?
Now if these guys would just inadvertently fix the user interface, or perhaps trip and fall into a total redesign, or accidentally re-organize and re-name all the tools using bumbled into industry standard names, and serendipitously selected value scales, they might unintentionally come up with something that, purely as a side effect, resembled, ever so slightly, the principal of Least Astonishment [wikipedia.org].
There are three types of software engineer (Score:5, Funny)
Those who deliberately engineer masterpieces, those who "inadvertently" engineer masterpieces and those who write the (cough) software that causes the other two groups to act.
In this case, these accidental geniuses are responsible for work that mainstream GIMP developers had long claimed was impossible. From the looks of it, six impossible things were achieved, so said developers should round things off with a meal at Milliways.
Re:Version math (Score:2, Funny)
Welcome to "how version numbers have worked for at least twenty years". Enjoy the stay.
Typical GIMP questions from /.ers (Score:5, Funny)
"Does it still suck at CMYK...because where I work we are focusing *so hard* on CMYK right now, it'd be ridiculous for GIMP not to support that" --a_complete_liar
"I noticed that the interface is still a series of 'windows'...my granddaughter's IPAD allows her to paint the entire mona lisa with her pinky finger, never even showing a single window. WHAT HAPPENED TO OPEN SOURCE???" --300baud
"Anybody know of an alternative to GIMP that lets you publish to ebook formats like Kindle? I need to be able to import a 1200 page scientific text, and I want to have drop shadows on the letters and a parchment background. Also something that exports to iBooks would be great but I can't pay any money for this, and I don't want to have to work for an hour to make it all just work." --cluelessphd
that "Eureka" moment in every program's dev cycle (Score:5, Funny)
"Oops! Oh, it worked?" ...
"Crap. WHY does it work? It totally shouldn't work!" ...
*shrug* "Ship it."
Re:Version math (Score:4, Funny)
I'd love to see the brainfuck that ensues when you're tasked with figuring out whether 192.168.0.1 comes before or after 192.168.0.10.
I'm hoping for something on a similar level to that video that went viral of the blonde trying to figure out miles per hour.