Today I was looking at the InfoWorld Best of Open Source Software Awards 2009.  InfoWorld is a sometimes dubious, but often entertaining online techno-rag.  They are generally upbeat about open source projects.  Regardless, I’m always interested to see what different areas seem to value in the open source arena.  Looking over their selections I think there are some projects that may be of interest to my readers, based on previous comments.  If you do end up working with some of these, join the Real World Open Source group in My developerWorks and share your experience.

What’s with the whining about GIMP?

I’ve used GIMP, the open source photo editing software, for years now.  I’ve even turned on a few people to it who were looking for a free solution.  (It’s multi-platform, of course!)  Today I read several comments in different people with complaining about the GIMP interface.  I’ve used it to touch up photos to remove red-eye and blemishes.  I’ve also done some weirder stuff with it, like opening my eyes in a picture of me in front of Stonehenge where I was squinting.  I’ve used it to remove reflections of photographers and other offending objects.  I once used it to restore the dignity of a many by closing his fly in what was otherwise a good picture.  (You never know what you’ll be asked when people discover that you can do things!)

GIMP is a complex graphical program.  You need to understand some basic concepts abou layers, transparency, masking and some other things to make good use of it.  These concepts seem to be present in other commercial packages.  Any powerful program requires you to understand some things.  I just don’t get what is so confusing.  Maybe I’m wired too geekily, but it makes sense to me and I find it to be one of my favorite and most-used tools.  It really just works.

Oh, well.  Back to work!