Not sure if this is the right place for this but technically Gimp for windows and gimp for Ubuntu are different. Anyway, I wanted to put gimp on my ubuntu computer, which was easy, but when i tried to copy my scripts, brushes, splash screen etc it won't let me. I copy the files from the CD or USB stick then go to the Gimp folder and try to paste them in the paste area is grayed out. Am I missing something childishly simple? I signed up at the ubuntu forum but I'm misanthropic in my old age and prefer to stick with people I'm familiar with. When this gets resolved i have a few other small issues I'll ask about.

I've had no problems copying brushes and patterns between my Windows GIMP and my VM Ubuntu GIMP. Not sure what the issue may be in your case though. Maybe someone with more experience with external USB drives and Ubuntu can inject there wisdom (I copied via shared drives).

Are you copying to .gimp-2-6 in your Home folder? If your trying in any other spot, i.e. /usr/share, you'll have to enter folder with administrative privileges. It's better to install in /home/(username)/.gimp-2.6.

i believe nixnine got the point, i must add that you will never found a .gimp folder in your home directory, if you don't change the file browser display options checking there "display hidden files"

In linux everything with name starting with "." is as default hidden...once you change that option you may be surprised to see how much files are in your home directory

Or just hit Ctrl H to reveal hidden files/folders.

Well that partly worked. I was trying to put it in the usr folder. I have everything else where you recommended but the splash image is in the usr/gimp folder and it will neither allow me to paste mine in nor delete the other one because I am not the owner, which I am. I set myself as administrator but that didn't seem to help.

I noticed what PC said right after i sent the other. i moved everything except the images folder to tat. I need to figure out how to get recognized as the owner now. Thanks

if you use Ubuntu the trick is just use "sudo"

You may simply type in the terminal "sudo nautilus" (or "sudo dolphin" if you have dolphin as file browser)and then do everything with your file browser.

just take care that everything means really everything, once you give a command as admin, will be executed even if catastrophic for your operative system

Create a folder called "splashes" in the .gimp-2.0 folder. Put your splashes there. You can put as many as you want and Gimp randomly picks one each time you start the program. And you don't have to worry about the name either. Pretty cool.

In addition to what nixnine said...

In Linux, you often maintain separate configurations per user/per app, with the config files stored as hidden files under the user folder. If you want to make global configurations that apply to all users or all apps on the system, you can modify the config files under /usr/share (which requires root/super user access). You can also choose to install fonts locally per app (say in GIMP) or globally in Linux to allow all of your apps to access the fonts.

I find it useful to start a terminal, enter super user mode "su -" and then run nautilus file manager as root..

nautilus --no-desktop --browser

or

sudo nautilus --no-desktop --browser

Many help threads in Ubuntu Forums suggest that when running graphical apps from the terminal as administrator to use gksudo rather than sudo or su-.

I would recommend never, ever put your personal resources in a default GIMP install location. A location that requires root privileges to add to makes no sense from a user perspective, unless you manage many different users on the same machine, who all need to have access to the resources from a central, unchangeable location. Besides, future installs of GIMP might come to change the install directory in ways that we cannot currently predict.

GIMP can look for resources anywhere on your harddrive if you just tell it where to look. You don't need to put it together with gimp's config files either. Preferences->Folders is the place to change this.

I have for example the folder "Art" under my home directory. This contains folders for artwork, and a "gimp-resources" folder:
gimp-resources/
Brushes
Fonts
ICCprofiles
Palettes
Plug-Ins
Gradients
Modules
Patterns
Scripts

If you want, you can also within each folder create two subfolders ACTIVE and INACTIVE. By just having GIMP look in the ACTIVE folder within each resource folder, you can easily manage which are available to GIMP at any time (if you have lots of stuff this can help speed GIMP's startup time). There is also a manager script (GURM) for GIMP that automates stuff like this.
So, once you have created such a structure, you just need to tell GIMP to look for resources also in those locations (it will look in the default locations too of course, to find resources shipped with GIMP). Makes your library of third-party stuff much more manageable. This process is outlined in my "Beginning GIMP" tutorial which you can find stickied on GimpTalk.

This also has the advantage of not being affected if you reinstall your system (as long as /home is on a separate partition).
.
Griatch

what the function of " --no-desktop --browser" ?

i use often sudo nautilus but i never used that, what the advantages ?

BTW i also see some crytpic error message anytime i use sudo nautilus, but apparently everything work, the messages ,if i decrypted well are about something in the nautilus gui that fails to be initialized or fail to close...i never give much importance to that message since everything seems working as should

The easiest way to manage files using the two panel manager
(choice of administrator privileges without terminal)
I recommend Gnome Commander or Krusader (using Synaptic)

If you are using KDE use kdesudo instead of gksudo...

I've been using Dolphin, if I need to I'll switch to Nautilus. I have myself set as admin/owner on all of my computers with Windows, I guess it's just a habit I'll have to break. I'll do all of the above things listed tonight when things are quiet. I haven't been a noob in ages but it's necessary. Thanks.