[Scribus] Scribus and CinePaint

[Steven Boothe]

Robin Rowe wrote:
> Craig,
> 
>> As I mentioned, I do think the GUI matters, but thats an issue for
>> the CP dev process. Aligning Scribus/Inkscape/Gimp across Qt and
>> GTK2 is hard enough but we are making progress.
> 
> How may it effect things that CinePaint is moving to FLTK?

Hi Robin, it's nice to see you here. I'm not a developer in the sense of 
one who contributes anything to the Scribus coding process. But being 
that as it may, and given that QT4 will be available via GPL for win32, 
I wish CinePaint could have went with QT as it would have made for more 
common-ground with not only Scribus but the greater QT development 
community as a whole. Which I think would help everyone concerned by 
giving the Trolltech folks another killer app to claim as a positive to 
what QT has contributed, as well as the recognition they could also 
bring from their website, in addition to the larger base of developers 
who would be more likely familiar with the code that they could jump in 
that much easier. But, IANAD, so I may be way off base here... :)

Still that written, had you read the following article at Newsforge? I 
thought you may find it interesting. Maybe you could facilitate filling 
that gap for publishing and usability mentioned?

Cheers, and all the best with the Cinepaint project.

Steven

Here are some of the more interesting paragraphs:

NewsForge | The GIMP at a crossroads

"... Now is the time to consider splitting up the program. Today the 
GIMP needs a new graphical user interface that is compatible with 
current standards, while at the same time the open source community 
needs a separate tool for publishing and Web design.

A few weeks back, I wrote an article arguing for the establishment of a 
common user interface standard among three products -- the GIMP, 
Scribus, and Inkscape -- in order to create an ensemble of products that 
could make a serious impact on the market. The feedback I received from 
readers and from professional graphic artists confirmed that one of the 
most serious obstacles in the way of collaboratively developing the 
aforementioned products is the odd layout of the GIMP, a feature-rich 
and well-loved bitmap editor of the open source community. Everyone 
acknowledged the great work GIMP developers have put into the product, 
but the fact has remained that GIMP's current interface defies the most 
basic rules of human-computer interaction standards. (Those who are 
interested in what these rules are, read the excellent article The First 
Principle of Interaction Design by Bruce Tognazzini. GNOME's Human 
Interface Guidelines are also a great source of information. More 
research papers on interface design can be found on Alias and Bill 
Buxton's Web site.)

Recently, senior open source advocates have also called for the creation 
of common user interface standards. Mitch Kapor, the president of the 
Open Source Applications Foundation, and Andrew Morton, the maintainer 
of the Linux kernel, called on developers to work toward the improvement 
of application interfaces. Kapor said, "Each component that comprises a 
desktop operating environment, whether the graphical interface, 
productivity applications, or browser, is being developed by different 
groups with little collaboration.... It's been a lack of motivation for 
these groups of developers to create a unified interface for users." 
Morton echoed similar ideas: "What we should concentrate on is 
well-defined interfaces and standards so that the projects can work 
together."

It is fair to say that the GIMP urgently needs a sleek, modern, and 
user-friendly look that complies with current interface standards. This 
is all the more important since other open source apps (e.g. Scribus and 
Inkscape) are already moving in that direction. Sharing a unified look 
and feel with them would make collaboration smoother from which 
ultimately, all programs could benefit.

Another reason for splitting up the GIMP is to create two bitmap editors 
with distinct functionalities and, possibly, personalities. The GIMP is 
the graphic editor of all tasks and it satisfies neither Web design nor 
publishing specifications completely. This dilemma could be solved by 
the creation of a lightweight bitmap editor for Web design and GIF 
animations and a separate graphic program for publishing; the latter 
could have enhanced CMYK functionality, color management, and high-level 
font specifications support."
http://software.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=05/02/24/1818224&tid=131