>"I don't get everyone's complaints about the interface. I've been using it for years..."

That's the problem, you have a bias because you've already learned the tribal knowledge. Having to learn it from scratch, GIMP's UI is sorely lacking. While it does have the tools, the organization of them is all over the place.

The learning curve certainly is a lot steeper than Photoshop or similar tools, and the GUI is very much counter intuitive compared to other graphics tools. Add that it lacked tons of nondestructive editing, smart objects etc. The poping out of different panels also get annoying super quick.

Export and Save As should be the same menu item with an option in the dialog.

There are many many more but start with the app having the overbearing assumption that it thinks you want save to its file format rather than make an ad hoc edit.

I'm a fairly casual / infrequent user, but they've already addressed most of the things I found infuriating in the past.

The big remaining thing I can think of is the "layer boundary" thing, which (it seems to me) is very confusing for new users and inconvenient for all users.

I also have a vibes-based feeling that when I used to use Photoshop twenty-five years ago I was a lot more productive than I'm able to be in GIMP, but I can't be sure if that's just because I used to do more graphic stuff back then and I've never picked it up to the same degree. I find myself having to hunt for things in menus a lot, but that might be a me problem. Photoshop also took a while to get used to.

Edit: I basically agree with the people complaining about Save and Export being unexpectedly separate, although I also think it's not that hard to press Ctrl+E instead of Ctrl+S.

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For decades, the tools panels floated separately from the image window, and the authors resolutely refused to put them in a single window.

Then one day, they did it. They put the tools on the same window as the image, as Deluxe Paint did in 1985. FINALLY.

... but at the same time, they introduced the absolute bollocks that is "if you hit save we're going to spam you indefinitely into using our format".

In any other tool, if you _open_ a file (e.g. a PNG, JPEG, or in say LibreOffice's case, a CSV or XLSX), and then hit "save", it can nag you once that you're not using the tool's preferred file format, and _may_ be missing some important feature that only its preferred format supports... but you should just be able to click "fuck that, save it as the format I loaded it as" and not hear that again.

Not GIMP. It fucking well refuses to let you save as the format you opened. You have to cancel your "save" of the file you opened, and instead "export" to the file you opened... at which point it warns you you'll overwrite THE FILE YOU WANT TO SAVE. And after you've done that, and try to close the image, it'll warn you you haven't saved THE FUCKING FILE IT JUST FORCED YOU TO USE "EXPORT" TO SAVE because you didn't save it in its preferred format ABSOLUTELY GO FUCK YOURSELF, GIMP, I AM NOT GOING TO SAVE AS XCF A JPEG I AM CROPPING AND WILL NEVER EVER EDIT AGAIN

This is why I completely gave up on GIMP and will never open it again. I would like to line up all the GIMP authors in a row, and run down the line slapping them all in the face with a wet trout.

If anyone from GIMP is listening:

    * User opens a non-native format, e.g. JPEG
    * User hits "Save"
    * Present user with a dialog like so:
        This image may contain content that cannot be saved in the currently selected file format "JPEG"
        Use the default XCF file format to be sure the image is saved correctly
        [x] Ask when not saving in XCF or default format
        [Use JPEG format] [Use XCF format]
    * User can turn off this nag globally by deselecting "Ask when not saving in XCF or default format"
    * If user selects "Use JPEG format", future saves of this file will not nag again

I once tried to use GIMP and gave up after 2 hours and got the task done in figma in 10 minutes. GIMP is a UX atrocity. The interface is a cluttered mess of meaningless panels and buttons. Worst for me is i'd spend 15 mins googling/reading how to do something, look for the corresponding buttons for 10 minutes, be unable to find them, and later discover they were on a panel that wasn't enabled by default (I didn't even know you had to enable panels; i'd assumed everything that was available was there in front of me). On macOS some panels randomly disappear behind other programs.

It was like using a computer program in your dreams where things don't really have to make sense.

My theory is this is a classic OSS problem where everyone wants to contribute their pet feature but the project lacks discipline and nobody wants to remove, organise, and improve (especially where the latter can be 10x harder and more tedious then the former). This could be an argument for opinionated leaders in OSS projects, because at least they'll say 'no' and do things 'their' way a lot of the time, which is often better than the 'anything goes' philosophy.

Between GIMP releases we saw entire graphics pipelines, conventions and workflows come and go. We had the Affinity suite, Canva, Paint.net, Clip Paint Studio, Sketch, various attempts from Adobe at expanding beyond the Photoshop ecosystem (Anyone remembers XD?), probably something else I’m missing right now. Now we’re in the age of Figma, with its own UI and quirks.

At this point it’s probably easier to accept that the GIMP UI is simply what GIMP developers want it to be.

True, it doesn’t make a lick of sense, but the same could be said about Turbotax, Jira, SAP… or God may have mercy on your soul, Avid Pro Tools.

It is what it is. It’s not like there are no alternatives anymore.

From tfa

> A lot of new and existing contributors have submitted improvements to GIMP’s user interface and its user experience. We wanted to highlight their efforts, and encourage you all to continue sharing your feedback on our design issue tracker.

I see no active resistance. If you have feedback, maybe share it with them?

The attitude partly affects GNOME too, any time you'd constructively criticize it on places like their Issue tracker or r/gnome, their defenders would come with pitchforks at you. Glad I moved to KDE nearly a decade ago.

It could also be that the Gimp team and community wants their software a certain way, and I don't see why one should disrespect that?

Those who disagree are welcome to fork- and maintain it, if the users see value in it, they'll switch.

I’m going to take the bait:

I know a lot of people don't like that but sometimes I feel that FOSS projects are intentionally sabotaging themselves by ignoring industry standard options/conventions and instead they are following open source ideas just to be different. GIMP is the perfect example of that and generally speaking UI/UX is the main symptom.

Blender was able to move forward by not listening to the FOSS crowd but to the industry. And see where are they now compared to GIMP.

I love that GIMP exists but... I have to say, it never got rid of the "backend developer doing frontend" feeling, and I've been aware of Gimp for 20 years now (did not know how to...ehem, run photoshop in my teens)

Do you have your special dark mode glasses on?

Because I fail to see all the comments here as negative and unfounded. (and my guess why there is often negativity towards GIMP, is because it was too often advertised as a adequate Photoshop replacement, which it is not, so people got disappointed with it)

… and the sizes of their updates are usually impressive! Seems to be a big project that is managed well to keep a good pace and keep the community in the loop. (Although I don’t know much about their inner workings.)

It's a great piece of software. Best feature - not having your colours retrospectively removed from your project [1].

[1] https://www.reddit.com/r/graphic_design/comments/rdtodb/adob...

Yes, it is very pleasant to have it around. Especially when you switch to something else.

Furthermore, it's free software. If people have a problem with it, they're free to show up and contribute, or fork if the community is really opposed to their ideas (they probably are for good reason, though).

Haven't those existed in Krita forever?

That is probably the V3 feature I'd notice most in daily use. Non-destructive editing makes experimentation much less costly; without it, every “maybe this looks better” becomes another layer or file copy.