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Children of the Revolution 53 of 53 Ciao Users found the following review helpful
Rating from runonthespot 5 Stars ()

Advantages It's free. It's powerful.

Disadvantages Not shrink-wrapped.

The GIMP
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No, it’s not something from the cellar in Pulp Fiction—The GIMP is a piece of open source software that rivals the likes of Photoshop and Paintshop Pro.

For those unfamiliar with Open-source—essentially the software is free, and what a revolution it is!

Background
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GIMP stands for Gnu Image Manipulation Program, and was designed originally to run on Unix (later, Linux), to fill a photoshop-shaped-hole on their platform.

Fortunately for those of us too frightened to play with operating systems, there is a version available for Microsoft Windows, and it is that version I’ll be reviewing.

The GIMP is probably an example of the sort of program that most people miss, probably due to it’s slightly unfortunate name. Once you get over the leather / S&M connotations, you discover a little gem of a program that (quite frankly) puts the high-price-tag of Photoshop to shame.

Getting and installing the software
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Free software, unfortunately, is seldom found in any packaged form. The easiest way to get hold of this, then, is to buy something like the .Net magazine.

NOTE: I wasn’t able to confirm if the GIMP was on the cover of last month’s issue, but it generally is. (I recommend checking the CD-Contents section of the magazine to find out before buying).

You can also get the installs from this site
http://www2.arnes.si/~sopjsimo/gimp/

Where you need to download
GTK+ for Windows (version 1.3.0-20030717)
--and--
The Gimp for Windows (version 1.2.5-20030722)

(And for all the Mac users out there there is also a Mac-OS-X port here- http://mmmaybe.gimp.org/macintosh/)

And install them both in that order.

I found this very straight forward once a friend had pointed me to this site. If anyone has any trouble with these, please let me know.

Before We Begin, What To Expect…
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Before firing up, it’s worth noting a few differences to expect from your experience with this program. I found these out by playing, but know from experience that a few subtle differences in interface can often really put people off. In the words of the late great Douglas Adams: DON'T PANIC.

1) The Menu’s Look Sort of Odd.
That’s because they don’t use Microsoft’s standard menu interface… this is what GNU menu’s look like, thus escaping the tyranny of proprietory licensing of code (and saving money).

2) The cursor sometimes looks backwards
Erm.. I think linux advocates call it a User Interface Improvement. More likely a stamp of individuality, but quite easy to ignore after a short time.

3) The “File->Open” screen is strange—where are “My Documents”?
Again- the authors avoided using Microsoft proprietory menu’s etc. "My Documents" is normally under C:\Documents and Settings\(user name)\My Documents.

4) Radio buttons look funny.
Radio buttons (the round “option” buttons, like the ones found on Ciao’s online surveys) under linux/gnu tend to be diamond shaped. Don’t worry, they work just the same as normal option buttons!

And so, onto the program itself.

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  • AndrewPo 14/11/2008 18:32
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