https://forum.dlang.org/post/hinhcixficvfjwidaknc@forum.dlang.org

On Sunday, 1 September 2019 at 18:57:07 UTC, Kamran wrote:
> Hello everyone,
> People who forked GIMP, a popular open source image editor are discussing on which language to choose for their rewrite at [1] and they are considering D. Maybe some of you can help them out.
>
> [1] https://github.com/glimpse-editor/Glimpse/issues/70

Maybe they need to read...

https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/

-=mike=-

On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 09:36:28 UTC, Mike James wrote:
> https://forum.dlang.org/post/hinhcixficvfjwidaknc@forum.dlang.org
>
> On Sunday, 1 September 2019 at 18:57:07 UTC, Kamran wrote:
>> Hello everyone,
>> People who forked GIMP, a popular open source image editor are discussing on which language to choose for their rewrite at [1] and they are considering D. Maybe some of you can help them out.
>>
>> [1] https://github.com/glimpse-editor/Glimpse/issues/70
>
> Maybe they need to read...
>
> https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/
>
> -=mike=-

Especially since they chose D, I am surprised with the idea of a full rewrite.
Gradual transition from a C/C++ code-base is an area where D shines like no other language.

On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 11:07:39 UTC, Mathias LANG wrote:
> On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 09:36:28 UTC, Mike James wrote:
> Gradual transition from a C/C++ code-base is an area where D shines like no other language.

Disagree.

I use GIMP a lot and while it's dependable and fast and featureful... it's pretty clear it has a considerable UX problem.
Everything takes a few precise clicks, and even finding the right window is a bit hard. I spent a lot of time changing the brush size and the size isn't log, just a slider from 1 to <unusable> pixels.

It's not _bad_, it's just getting increasingly important to be agreeable and quick to learn.

Unfortunately, UX in modern consumer programs is getting so important everything has to be designed around it, so I think a rewrite would yield superior usability.
Programs that are rich in functionality but hard to learn will be replaced with programs where workflow was considered with more weight ; even when the replacement has less features.

On 7/2/20 7:07 AM, Mathias LANG wrote:
> On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 09:36:28 UTC, Mike James wrote:
>> https://forum.dlang.org/post/hinhcixficvfjwidaknc@forum.dlang.org
>>
>> On Sunday, 1 September 2019 at 18:57:07 UTC, Kamran wrote:
>>> Hello everyone,
>>> People who forked GIMP, a popular open source image editor are discussing on which language to choose for their rewrite at [1] and they are considering D. Maybe some of you can help them out.
>>>
>>> [1] https://github.com/glimpse-editor/Glimpse/issues/70
>>
>> Maybe they need to read...
>>
>> https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/ 
>>
>>
>> -=mike=-
> 
> Especially since they chose D, I am surprised with the idea of a full rewrite.
> Gradual transition from a C/C++ code-base is an area where D shines like no other language.

They appear not to have said exactly what the rewrite will entail - and a lot of the discussion on that thread is how D allows usage of C libraries.

I'm a bit surprised at the UI rewrite, as D has good GTK support, and the focus of GIMP is not really UI. They could easily use GTK and make the UX better.

-Steve

On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 09:36:28 UTC, Mike James wrote:
> https://forum.dlang.org/post/hinhcixficvfjwidaknc@forum.dlang.org
>
> On Sunday, 1 September 2019 at 18:57:07 UTC, Kamran wrote:
>> Hello everyone,
>> People who forked GIMP, a popular open source image editor are discussing on which language to choose for their rewrite at [1] and they are considering D. Maybe some of you can help them out.
>>
>> [1] https://github.com/glimpse-editor/Glimpse/issues/70
>
> Maybe they need to read...
>
> https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/
>
> -=mike=-

Isn't that a one sided view? How about the many rewrites that turned out making a huge comeback?

I'll say it depends, so one should should consider the trade-offs.

Probably that's what you meant.

On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 14:38:11 UTC, Steven Schveighoffer wrote:
> On 7/2/20 7:07 AM, Mathias LANG wrote:
>> On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 09:36:28 UTC, Mike James wrote:
>>> https://forum.dlang.org/post/hinhcixficvfjwidaknc@forum.dlang.org
>>>
>>> On Sunday, 1 September 2019 at 18:57:07 UTC, Kamran wrote:
>>>> Hello everyone,
>>>> People who forked GIMP, a popular open source image editor are discussing on which language to choose for their rewrite at [1] and they are considering D. Maybe some of you can help them out.
>>>>
>>>> [1] https://github.com/glimpse-editor/Glimpse/issues/70
>>>
>>> Maybe they need to read...
>>>
>>> https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/
>>>
>>>
>>> -=mike=-
>> 
>> Especially since they chose D, I am surprised with the idea of a full rewrite.
>> Gradual transition from a C/C++ code-base is an area where D shines like no other language.
>
> They appear not to have said exactly what the rewrite will entail - and a lot of the discussion on that thread is how D allows usage of C libraries.
>
> I'm a bit surprised at the UI rewrite, as D has good GTK support, and the focus of GIMP is not really UI. They could easily use GTK and make the UX better.
>
> -Steve


Now GTK+ has usability issues beyond the usual UI stuff. Its a C problem. That could be a factor. I believe Gimp is the most complex application using Gtk... large C codebase is a message without those high-level language features.

On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 15:15:47 UTC, aberba wrote:
> I believe Gimp is the most complex application using Gtk...

GTK stands for Gimp ToolKit

On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 09:36:28 UTC, Mike James wrote:
> https://forum.dlang.org/post/hinhcixficvfjwidaknc@forum.dlang.org
>
> On Sunday, 1 September 2019 at 18:57:07 UTC, Kamran wrote:
>> Hello everyone,
>> People who forked GIMP, a popular open source image editor are discussing on which language to choose for their rewrite at [1] and they are considering D. Maybe some of you can help them out.
>>
>> [1] https://github.com/glimpse-editor/Glimpse/issues/70
>
> Maybe they need to read...
>
> https://www.joelonsoftware.com/2000/04/06/things-you-should-never-do-part-i/
>
> -=mike=-

I think rewrites can be valid if you switch from a buggy/verbose language like C/C++ to a more modern D/rust. You do more with less code and in the long term, you have a more clean code base where you can focus on solving the actual problem rather the thousands of undefined behaviors, verbosity of C/C++. Now, just rewrite a huge C/C++ code base in C/C++ looking for clean up the code, that, I think it is going to be a huge massive waste of time.

On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 16:09:10 UTC, Liu wrote:
> On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 09:36:28 UTC, Mike James wrote:
>> https://forum.dlang.org/post/hinhcixficvfjwidaknc@forum.dlang.org
>>
>> -=mike=-
>
> I think rewrites can be valid if you switch from a buggy/verbose language like C/C++ to a more modern D/rust. You do more with less code and in the long term, you have a more clean code base where you can focus on solving the actual problem rather the thousands of undefined behaviors, verbosity of C/C++.

Yes if you can do the rewrite a bit at a time and make the code more maintainable, more open to improvement and modification in the future. So it's less a rewrite more a migration with future proofing in mind.

But you have to be careful it's not "this code sucks so we'll rewrite it in D and then it wont suck". It's perfectly feasible to rewrite it from the ground up and it'll still suck.

On 7/2/20 12:03 PM, JN wrote:
> On Thursday, 2 July 2020 at 15:15:47 UTC, aberba wrote:
>> I believe Gimp is the most complex application using Gtk...
> 
> GTK stands for Gimp ToolKit
> 

It used to. It was invented as a replacement for Motif for GIMP, as Motif was not free, and there were no open toolkits for Unix except for Xt at the time. Now it's just GTK.

And I'd hazard to guess Gnome is probably the most complex application using GTK.

-Steve