Please forgive me if I have posted this in the wrong place, but there is no "Post new thread" button when I view the GIMP 2.10 section.
I have used GIMP 2.8 for many years, I think it is a brilliant program, and thanks to the developers for it. As I have had to move to a later operating system (now Mint 20.1), the default installation of GIMP is now 2.10.18.1. I have had so many problems trying to use this new version and I have spent more time researching the problems than I have been spending time being productive with it. I have had enough, I never had any problems with version 2.8 (I am only a basic user) and I want to go back to it. For me it is much easier to use.
Can someone tell me, in individual steps, what I have to do, please?
Thanks in advance.
With some luck you can find an "AppImage" or a "flatpack" with Gimp 2.8, but from memory these started to flourish with Gimp 2.10 to compensate for 2.10 install problems, so I don't know if any were made with 2.8.
Otherwise you can recompile from the tarballs (you also need older versions GEGL/BABL). For the sake of it I recompiled a 2.4 a while ago
However, 2.10 fixes a number of issues, adds plenty of fucntionality and is much better overall than 2.8. Since you are a first poster here you could start by listiing the problems you have with 2.10, some may not be totally Gimp's problem (for instance Python support) and the comminity could point to solutions. If you don't move to 2.10 you won't move to 3.0 either and will be stuck on 2.8 forever. I've seen someone recently who wanted to install 2.4 to not break any habits (after eventually replacing his PC that was running WinXP) but I don't envy him.
Thank you Ofnuts for your prompt and detailed reply.
Unfortunately I have many problems with GIMP 2.10. I only do very basic photo editing and I have never needed any additional functionality than that offered by 2.8.
Here are my issues with 2.10, in order of importance.
1. The coloring of the menus and tools in GIMP 2.10 has been removed. This is a dreadful backward step, worse for me as I am visually impaired.
2. The most recent issue I had was that the clone icon disappeared from the Tools menu. I then spent an entire afternoon (unsuccessfully) attempting to find out how to recover it, and realized that icons missing apparently is an issue with version 2.10. I couldn't find anything that related exactly to my problem (it disappeared while I was using it and, as far as I know, it's the only one that's disappeared) but I eventually tried removing the program from the command line using 'sudo apt purge' and then reinstalled it, but this did not solve the problem.
3. It seems the developers of all software and operating systems want to push a "clean look" to everything upon us, and this comes at the cost of usability and, in some cases, even functionality. I recently upgraded another machine from Ubuntu 16.04 LTS to 20.04.2 and while it has a cleaner look, the buttons I was used to seeing in some programs have all been buried behind menu buttons, and worse still, some functionality has been removed. Great for a clean look, however reducing usability and functionality to this degree I would think drops the maximum target audience age to around 8 years! I couldn't believe what I saw in the supposedly improved version, apart from the fact that it was noticeably faster. This was the reason I dropped Ubuntu and moved to Mint (version 18 of which I had been running on this machine for some time). I am rambling, so back to the subject - this "we must have a clean look" mind set seems to have been applied to GIMP 2.10, and now we have to search in black and white icon groups (which, as I have said, are extremely difficult for me to distinguish) to look for the tools we want.
4. Did keyboard shortcuts work in 2.8? I don't know as I never used them, but "C" for the clone tool doesn't work in 2.10. It's as though the tool has been completely removed.
5. GIMP 2.8 has floating panes, which can be a pain (pun intended) at times but it allows me to clone from one image to another, and I can watch the cursor on the source image at the same time as the image I am pasting on to. In 2.10 They are locked and we have a new tab at the top left to switch between the images. This is useless for cloning from one to another.
By the way, the program (V2.10) on my other machine has not lost its Clone tool icon so I was able to complete my work on that.
(02-12-2021, 11:22 AM)Scooby-2 Wrote: [ -> ]Thank you Ofnuts for your prompt and detailed reply.
Unfortunately I have many problems with GIMP 2.10. I only do very basic photo editing and I have never needed any additional functionality than that offered by 2.8.
Here are my issues with 2.10, in order of importance.
1. The coloring of the menus and tools in GIMP 2.10 has been removed. This is a dreadful backward step, worse for me as I am visually impaired.
2. The most recent issue I had was that the clone icon disappeared from the Tools menu. I then spent an entire afternoon (unsuccessfully) attempting to find out how to recover it, and realized that icons missing apparently is an issue with version 2.10. I couldn't find anything that related exactly to my problem (it disappeared while I was using it and, as far as I know, it's the only one that's disappeared) but I eventually tried removing the program from the command line using 'sudo apt purge' and then reinstalled it, but this did not solve the problem.
3. It seems the developers of all software and operating systems want to push a "clean look" to everything upon us, and this comes at the cost of usability and, in some cases, even functionality. I recently upgraded another machine from Ubuntu 16.04 LTS to 20.04.2 and while it has a cleaner look, the buttons I was used to seeing in some programs have all been buried behind menu buttons, and worse still, some functionality has been removed. Great for a clean look, however reducing usability and functionality to this degree I would think drops the maximum target audience age to around 8 years! I couldn't believe what I saw in the supposedly improved version, apart from the fact that it was noticeably faster. This was the reason I dropped Ubuntu and moved to Mint (version 18 of which I had been running on this machine for some time). I am rambling, so back to the subject - this "we must have a clean look" mind set seems to have been applied to GIMP 2.10, and now we have to search in black and white icon groups (which, as I have said, are extremely difficult for me to distinguish) to look for the tools we want.
4. Did keyboard shortcuts work in 2.8? I don't know as I never used them, but "C" for the clone tool doesn't work in 2.10. It's as though the tool has been completely removed.
5. GIMP 2.8 has floating panes, which can be a pain (pun intended) at times but it allows me to clone from one image to another, and I can watch the cursor on the source image at the same time as the image I am pasting on to. In 2.10 They are locked and we have a new tab at the top left to switch between the images. This is useless for cloning from one to another.
By the way, the program (V2.10) on my other machine has not lost its Clone tool icon so I was able to complete my work on that.
- There are themes to change Gimp appearance (Edit>Preferences>Interface>Theme and Edit>Preferences>Interface>Icon Theme
- With all the new tools the toolbox is getting really busy, so they invented tool groups (notice the little triangle in the corners of some icons). This can be disabled (or you can make your own groups). See Edit>Preferences>Toolbox>Use tool groups.
- Matter of taste. The Gimp GUI is highly customizable, the devs do look at the comments for the large community of users for a default setup, you can always make you own if you disagree (seee below).
- The Clone tool is still there, and it still has an icon in the toolbox (if enabled and not hidden in a group) and its shortcut is still 'C' (otherwise see Edit>Keyboard shortcuts and search "Clone") (and if all else fails you can always use the menu Tools>Paint tools>Clone to reach it)
- Windows>Single-window mode and reset it.
Screenshot of my 2.10 toolbox (the little triangles in the bottom right corner of icons indicate there is a group):
A quick try to install Gimp 2.8 packages in a Mint 20. Too many dependency issues, especially with GEGL. As ofnuts comment, you can compile from source.
Not going to write reams on this, there is already much on the subject
1. You can change the theme
Edit -> Preferences -> Theme https://i.imgur.com/IGpgmST.jpg and the icon theme and size
Edit -> Preferences -> Icon Theme https://i.imgur.com/PN7yFgF.jpg
2. The tools are now in groups, click on an icon for a drop down menu or the mouse scroll wheel, however you can go back to one icon per tool.
Edit -> Preferences -> Toolbox and untick Use tool groups
https://i.imgur.com/sH8dMrW.jpg
3. See 1.
4. Keyboard shortcuts, Look in the Tools
menu and next to a tool is the shortcut. 'C' works here but it might have been removed (somehow).
5. The multi-window mode is still there same as in Gimp 2.8 untick
Windows -> Single Window Mode
Differences between machine installations. Gimp 2.10 will try and 'inherit' some settings / scripts / plugins from an existing Gimp 2.8 installation - rename your ~/.gimp-2.8 profile to disable it.
If you are using an older computer maybe with a smaller display say, 1366x768 you will struggle to fit Gimp 2.10 Keep the tool groups and compact sliders.
You probably do not like videos but I do keep them short and to the point:
https://youtu.be/UgKL03OZI8k duration 3 minutes.
Wow, what brilliant responses from both of you guys, really quick too. Your suggestions have resolved
all my issues, thank you so much.
@rich2005 Thanks for the video. I actually prefer video tutorials as I download them using a bash front-end to youtube-dl which I wrote ages ago, but I am currently improving it. I have a large-screen TV with an HDMI connection to an OSMC media server and I view the tutorials on that. For me it is easier to see than to read text.
Thanks again to you both. What a great introduction to the GIMP community! It would be nice if I could give something back, watch this space....