Users:Beginner Developer's FAQ
From GIMP Developer Wiki
Many of those questions are not answered yet. Feel free to change it!
What should I know when starting with open source development?
If you're new to open source development, the article '10 golden rules for starting with open source' from Tobias Schlitt offers useful and worth knowing hints.
How do I find out, what tasks I could accomplish?
Currently the top priority is porting all plugins to GEGL and making GEGL faster.
You can also have a look at bug reports filed for GIMP and pick something. It's best to discuss working on something in either mailing list or IRC channel before beginning to fix things and implement features. This is because requests have to be checked against bigger design decisions. We'd hate if you wasted your time on something that shouldn't have been done.
For a broader view of things to do please refer to the Roadmap.
Where should I go for help when I need it?
There are several channels of communication:
- GIMP developer IRC channel: irc://irc.gimp.org/#gimp
Users without IRC client can connect using one of the many online IRC clients, such as: http://mibbit.com/?channel=%23gimp&server=irc.gimp.org
- GIMP mailing list for developers (gimp-developer |at| lists.xcf.berkeley.edu), but it's of course slower than IRC
Here you can find an overview of Gimp mailing lists: http://www.gimp.org/mail_lists.html
How to commit to Git tree?
GIMP uses GNOME's Git repository for source code storage. Please read their guidelines.
Please note that much like GNOME we want to work with you for a while before we can confirm that you are going to make a great upstream developer. Until then you can maintain your own branch on Github or Gitorious.
We also wrote a guide on submitting patches.
What's the best way to submit a patch?
This page describes how you can submit a patch. You can also post it to the mailing lists GIMP Developer or GEGL Developer, but this only applies to very small patches (at maximum 10 KB).
What's the best way to download, compile and keep up-to-date Gimp's source code?
Compiling GIMP
- General: Hacking:Building
- Additional descriptions for Linux: Hacking:Building/Linux
Short guide:
- Pull the sources down from git.
- Configure and make babl.
- Configure and make gegl.
- Configure and make gimp.
Installing needed libraries on Ubuntu
apt-get build-dep gimp
Links to more detailed descriptions:
- http://www.graphics-muse.org/artistsguide/?p=247
- http://www.chromecode.com/2009/12/best-way-to-keep-up-with-gimp-from-git_26.html
- http://lightningismyname.blogspot.com/p/compiling-gimp.html
How to compile Gimp for Windows?
The chapter Hacking:Building/Windows approaches this topic in detail.
Who is planning Gimp's development?
GIMP team's approach to planning is a little different. We do not have time-based schedules, instead we rely on a feature roadmap.
We use Git branches for developing major new features. If a feature is ready for inclusion into the main branch, it is merged. The decision, whether it's ready, is made by the core team (currently: mitch, Alexia), typically on IRC.
How do I know what should be done in Gimp?
You can use bugzilla to find bug reports you could take care of, but we encourage you contacting us beforehand to find out if the task you picked is still valid.
Major planned changes are listed at the feature roadmap page. Some miscellaneous ideas are here
Contacting the team is essential in both cases.
What are planned deadlines for next edititons of Gimp? Are there any?
Once we have a bigger team, we probably will have deadlines. At this point we don't have the resources to plan time-based releases.
What is ohloh.net for? Why developers are listed there and not on an official Gimp website?
The GIMP project itself doesn't maintain a site with an overview of the developers. If you want to know who are most active developers in the project, you can look at ohloh.net statistics of the last 12 months. Ohloh.net is free, public directory, a web service and online community platform that aims to map the landscape of open source development (see the description in the English Wikipedia). It collects information from public available source code repositories and creates statistics from it. To read more about ohloh.net, visit the ohloh.net self-introduction .
What is buildbot? How to use Buildbot for GIMP?
Why is it on http://gimptest.flamingtext.com:8012/ and not on official Gimp's website? What are the most common uses of the Buildbot?
Where to contribute to the future of GEGL?
You can find a good start for GEGL here: http://gegl.org/contribute.html
