computer science

GIMPshop

GIMPshop is a computer science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand GIMPshop rather than just read about it. In short: GIMPshop was a modification of the free and open source graphics program GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP), with the intent to imitate the look and feel of Adobe Photoshop. History GIMPshop was created by Scott Moschella of Next New Networks (formerly Attack of the Show!) as an unofficial fork of GIMP.

Key takeaways

GIMPshop belongs to computer science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect GIMPshop to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of GIMPshop from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

GIMPshop was a modification of the free and open source graphics program GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP), with the intent to imitate the look and feel of Adobe Photoshop.

History GIMPshop was created by Scott Moschella of Next New Networks (formerly Attack of the Show!) as an unofficial fork of GIMP. According to Moschella:

My original purpose for GIMPshop was to make the GIMP accessible to the many Adobe Photoshop users out there. I hope I’ve done that. And maybe along the way, I can convert a Photoshop pirate into a GIMP user. He encountered resistance from GIMP's lead developers due to the methods he employed to implement his hacks. GIMPshop was originally developed for Mac OS X as a Universal Binary. It was ported to Microsoft Windows, Linux, and Solaris. Development of GIMPshop effectively ceased by 2007, with the final version being based on GIMP version 2.2.11. Some users extended the lifespan of GIMPshop by manually updating GIMPshop's libraries themselves.

Features GIMPshop shared GIMP's feature list, customisability, and availability on multiple platforms, but had a different graphical user interface modeled on that of Photoshop. As a result, many tutorials for past versions of Photoshop could be followed in GIMPshop with little or no modification. All of GIMP's own plugins (filters, brushes, etc.) were available in GIMPshop. Being based on GIMP, GIMPshop could not generate CMYK output files by default. Users who needed to generate color separations required additional software, since commercial printing requires CMYK, not RGB color channels. A workaround was made available through the Separate+ plugin. In the Windows version, GIMPshop used a plugin called Deweirdifyer to combine the application's numerous windows in a similar manner to the MDI system used by most Windows graphics packages. This added a unifying background window that fully contained the entire GIMPshop UI. A third-party add-on for GIMP provided support for Photoshop plugins, called pspi, on Microsoft Windows or Linux. For Mac OS X, GIMPshop was compatible only with Panther (10.3.x) and Tiger (10.4.x). It requires the X11.app (based on the X Window System display protocol) to render the user interface. Newer versions of X11 are no longer compatible with GIMPshop.

Status Due to pending concerns over rights to the GIMPshop name, and a dispute with the individual who purchased the gimpshop.com domain, plans for an update were abandoned. As explained by Moschella in 2010:

Not more than a few days after the OS X version was released and spread virally, someone who isn't me bought "Gimpshop.com", put up a site with hot-links to the files on my site and began advertising - LOTS of advertising. Soon, there were donate buttons, my name in the site's title and much more - making it look like my website. I asked that the owner stop hot-linking my files (and draining my bandwidth), so he hosted them somewhere else. I questioned his motives and he said he was just a fan and that the site was a "fan-site".

It has been five years, the software has stagnated (due in no small part to my becoming discouraged by this one profiteer who trumped me, stole much of my traffic and bumped my site down to the second result when you search for "Gimpshop"). I assumed the guy would just give it up as I sadly let the project stagnate, but that hasn't happened. In a March 2014 discussion, Moschella states:

I originally created Gimpshop, but I'm not the jerk who owns that domain and added adware & spyware to the source. Sorry about that. I hate that this guy is out there making my fun little project into an abomination. ….

I don't have a project site for it. I became discouraged after this whole ordeal and I let it slip away into obscurity. …. Gimpshop was a fun little 'prank' that got bigger than I ever expected. Sad what it has become, though.

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with GIMPshop

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what GIMPshop claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In computer science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to GIMPshop before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about GIMPshop ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of GIMPshop

In research: GIMPshop appears in computer science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses GIMPshop in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: GIMPshop is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Free raster graphics editors, Graphics software that uses GTK, Raster graphics editors for Linux, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for GIMPshop outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study GIMPshop in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what GIMPshop means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain GIMPshop out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is GIMPshop in simple terms?

GIMPshop was a modification of the free and open source graphics program GNU Image Manipulation Program (GIMP), with the intent to imitate the look and feel of Adobe Photoshop. History GIMPshop was created by Scott Moschella of Next New Networks (formerly Attack of the Show!) as an unofficial fork…

Why does GIMPshop matter?

Because it connects several computer science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study GIMPshop?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on GIMPshop.