If crowdfunding for Gimp is the new way, it should be going to the Roadmap.

Crowdfunding is really meant for things that require an initial investment (i.e., they won't happen without some significant money being invested upfront: creating molds, etc...). This isn't the case for most open source software. I'm not even convinced that crowdfunding specific features is a good thing. These may require change "elsewhere" and put pressure on developers outside the crowdfunded part.

Which doesn't mean that we shouldn't help the Gimp project financially... there are many ways to donate, so that at least it doesn't cost a penny to the developers to work on Gimp.

I have but didn't spend too much time with it ofnuts. I usually do the wrap stuff manuallly. Again, I would rather just use a brush and paint have the brush come out on opposite sides of each.

I think that's a very interesting time for Gimp

Usually features only go in slowly because Gimp is only a hobby for the developers.
But now if a found raising can prove to be successfull at paying for implementing a feature in Gimp, that could give a nice boost to development if Gimp start to be able to put food on the table for the developers .

It has worked for Blender by example, very recently a developer implemented a specific feature concerning vertex normals that is usefull for keeping models sharp/smooth edge without needing to split them when exporting Blender work into Max/Maya after it got crowdfunded by those that wanted this to happen.
There was previously Bsurfaces and Riggify that got some form of money raising and got in thanks to the founding success.

Can it work for Gimp ? i guess this experience with the Symmetry feature under a Gimp dev control will tell.

think not - it only split's the manpower of the limited developer-team and this slow's down the overall developing process
it is simply a shot in the own knee's
to be clear: this is a look from the user's side, maybe the developers by themselves think different

Wrapping and symmetry are just to variants of the same thing (multi-brush) The only difference is that wrapping has 4 brushes with fixed L/R offsets based on the image width and symmetry has 2 or 4 brushes with changing offsets based on the main brush position.

-Rob A>

When you add fade-related brush dynamics (rotation, fade, thickness, opacity...) things get a bit more complicated. Just a SMOP (Sizeable Matter Of Programming)

some could turn it around again and again, it is a wrong way
where are these People, they now sream take my Money, when it comes to push the Donate-Button on the project-site?
10$ or € from every GIMP-user the year and i think the team has a comfortabel financial situation. to buy some hardware or hire some students for coding or whatever fit their needs.
10$ the year, 83 lousy cent's the month. that would push the development much more than every single-project funding.

Hey All, I have been promoting this crowdfunding site (and a few specific projects on it) as I really think its a great idea. I have also helped get it expanded to fund manuals/chapters so we are funding a Crypto Flossmanual aimed at small businesses.

This gimp feature is now 68% funded, with 77 gimp users donating an average of €18 each, ranging from around €5 to €250... so it's going well! I am feeling very positive about the venture

It would be great if everyone who had thought "I might get around to donating to that" could make a donation soon, even if its only a few euros, to give this project a boost and try and get it fully funded before Xmas.

I can see that a lot of people here dislike the idea, and a lot like it too. I just want to add my 2 cents

I feel this site is a good way of getting more people developing and a good way to support existing developers too. I feel it democratises funding as a wide group of people get donate to very specific things that they really care about. Of course that doesn't't stop general donations either, this is in addition to, not instead of, all our efforts to support gimp.

I hope that should this pilot funding go well, it could be tied to roadmap better. It's a good way to communicate about what features are coming and to raise funds while doing so for the central pot.

I really think that this is a positive project and I certainly don't think it detracts from our wonderful GIMP in anyway.

Have a great Christmas folks

That.

Isn't there a script/plug-in that does this already? I could have swore Saulgoode wrote one that does this a while back. Mirrors vertical, and horizontal.
http://chiselapp.com/user/saulgoode/rep ... mirror-dup

OR
Symmetry.py - http://registry.gimp.org/node/24247

I'm going to express my humble opinion here, as a disclaimer, this reflects my personal opinion only and no one is obligated to agree with it.

I think crowdsourcing is one of the best innovations of the 21st century, the implications are huge if you think about it, and it's also a really awesome and great way to fund open source / FOSS projects.

Richard Stallman, the guy behind the FSF and the GPL licenses, himself states that he thinks it's perfectly fine to charge money for free software, including GPL licensed software. I don't see the idea of FOSS as "free goodies for everyone!" but rather, that it guarantees certain freedoms to both users and developers (insofar as developers are also users). Free as in speech, not necessarily free as in beer.

The truth of the matter is, that software development costs money. Any sufficiently large FOSS project has to figure out ways how to fund development. Maybe they get corporate sponsors who benefit from the product and thus are willing to sponsor development for the benefit of all (too many examples to count, many FOSS projects do this). But this doesn't work for all projects - GIMP hasn't really managed to get such sponsors, not to any meaningful extent, AFAIK. Some projects attempt a more direct approach of selling binaries - Ardour, PartedMagic... you get ready-built binary packages if you pay a small amount, or you can pay for a subscription and get all the updates, which really just amounts to a fancy way of donations, as you can still get the same software for free if you compile from source.

Crowdfunding is a nice in-between alternative. The best part is that you can do this in small, granular parts, as many times as needed - and it's somewhat more popular than just asking for donations, because the customers get something in return for their money. You propose a new feature, and if enough people want to see that feature, they will offer funds to make it happen. What could be more in the spirit of free software?

FOSS is all about crowdsourcing the code - anyone can contribute code to a project. So the way I see it, paying someone else to contribute code on your behalf is just an evolved form of the same thing, really. Just like in the old days, everyone used to milk their own cows, but now we pay people to do it for us, and buy our milk from the supermarket.

Using a plugin or script similar...
Not quite to a painter if they were going to use a symmetry tool live performance would be a must as most change objects on the fly and are very visual drawing half a face etc. would be very hard to visualize how the centerline should behave while drawing. simple mirror image plugins could be handy if used on photos yet painting needs a more dynamic approach.

Of course seeing as the master branch has no canvas rotation I imagine not as many painters will be as interested given the many alternatives KRITA, MyPaint, ect. with similar features plus some.


I understand the concerns yet at the same time I can understand the amount of hard work and many hours put in by coders, time that could be spent with family and putting food on the table etc.
No ones talents should be free slave labor.
probably not as many people that could donate to gimp.org as there could be.

I don't mind seeing side projects like this popping up it would actually be interesting to see the results,
cooler still would be programmers that develop optional mods for gimp that can be mixed and matched similar to plugins to create a truly unique GIMP tailored to specific needs instead having to be part of gimps main branch.

What does "that" mean?

Me too! So many amazing inovative projects are made this way



Indeed. Free as in beer has personally been very to me over the past few years - my partner was seriously ill and we lost 90% of our income pretty much over night. I don't know how I would have managed to get work without gimp and kdenlive and wordpress etc free of charge. We built a whole business for him to do from home, using only free software (Ethical Pets)

BUT, that said, I am a Free Software campaigner, and put volunteer hours running groups and stuff, because of the free as in freedom part... I believe in this to its core and believe it is the only ethical and logical way to work. It puts a very high value on creativity and also on kindness, international relations, social responsibility, sharing, and progressing the world together... I really love it.

And - we can have free as in beer, free as in freedom AND fund-raise using crowd-funding. These things are not opposites.



Yes, many projects do this: but I personally prefer a large number of small donations from a wide group of users when possible - it keeps the ownership of the software clearly in the community.



Yes, as someone who uses only free software but does not code, the capacity to pay developers is very exiting. It's is VERY often said when explaining Free Software to non technical people that:

"The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source code is a precondition for this."

IS relevant to them because should they wish to, they can pay someone to make the changes for them (and that those changes go "up-stream" and benefit everyone else). The number of times I have said that when running talks - but its never actually happened that way in practice... till now

Below's what I posted at GIMPusers a little over 3 months ago.

I've given some (not enough) money to projects like G'MIC in the past. Other programs too when the program was free but donations encouraged. Yes, if I really wanted a feature enough, I would donate something for it (paypal please).

One feature that's been promised but put off is a layer wrap feature. If your brush goes off layer, it would automatically wrap to the opposite side (cloning tool as well). Would make creating seamless textures child's play.

I have no problem with crowdfunding features and no problem supporting them myself, as long as :
1 - the crowdfund initiator is not a random guy that could then easily be preparing some fraud
2 - the feature is guaranteed to get into Gimp
3 - i have an use of the feature
4 - the money requested is reasonnable.

In relation to the symmetry crowdfunding, 1- and 2- are covered, by the news from the Gimp.org website showing that the initiator is serious and the gimp devs are favourable to it :


For 3- having tasted painting with symmetry in MyPaint it's really good and usefull, and for texture making on UV map that are made symmetrical it's simply a big gain of time

Now my problem is with 4- , while being a Gimp user i'm a Blender user and several devs , both core and community ones have been founded to develop specific features that were more complex than only a symmetry function.
And that for half and sometime even less money than what the Symmetry crowdfunding project asked for.

That's why i decided to not support this, while it's useful as a feature for my needs 2000€ for a symmetry is way too much .