Linux for Designers

That is really sweet: Made by Via Lori Grunin & Adam Jerugim.

As i announced Gimp 2.6.1 is now available for download(details at the release notes). Packages for Ubuntu can be grabed at GetDeb.net).
Besides that the Gimp User Manual reaches version 2.4.2 (but is still focused on the 2.4 branch of Gimp).
The script collections Gimp FX Foundry is now released for Gimp 2.6.x branch: "fixes any issues scripts ... and also corrects a lot of deprecated syntax".
The new ASE import plugin for Gimp allows you importing of color palettes created with Adobe Kuler.

After creating a new splash for TORCS (using Blender and Gimp) i finished now a new Tango styled icon for TORCS. I enjoyed it again working with Inkscape:
How i did it:
* Set up the document (Shift+Ctrl+D) to 48x48px size
* Setup in the same dialogue the grid with 1px space
* Diplay the grid (View > Grid)
* Optional let the paths snap to the grid
* Now create/ design your icon but make sure everything used full pixel sizes/ positions
* Export the images as PNG (File > Bitmap export)

TORCS is available for Windows too and so i have to create a multiformat icon in the Windows ICO format too. Gimp make it possible to save images as the required format. The bad thing is that Gimp can't create multiformat icons (like Sibcodes plugin for Photoshop). Gimp didn't add resources it always replaces the full icon I created a bug report for Gimp 2.6.0.
Stupid me, GIMP can do!
Creating a multi-format Windows ICO with Gimp:
* Open the biggest icon PNG (in my case 48x48)
* drag all smaller resolutions into it
* If you like to create various color depths duplicate the layers often as needed (i duplicated them one time because i'd like to export 24bpp and 32bpp icons)
* Now save the layered image as an *.ico
* At save dialogue assign the color depth to any layer
* Save it, you will get an Ico file with various sizes and color depth

The release of Gimp 2.6 is very close and so there are a bunch of new features added to the Gimp 2.5.x development version. The developers looking know for people helping to update the translations of GIMP.
UPDATE: You can grab some Deb archives for Ubuntu Hardy here (but be carefull it replaces Gimp 2.4.x): https://launchpad.net/~c-korn/+archive

It rumors that the final of Gimp 2.6 will be available this month. I do not know the truth especially we hadn't a official announcement of 2.5.2 yet. At Gimpusers.com you will find a first summery about what's new in Gimp 2.6.

After 15 years of development and 5 release candidates Wine is published today as 1.0. In the release candidate phase so many bugs were fixed and Wine runs really smooth now my favorite Windows apps. If you ever had problems with older versions of Wine you should give it a try again
Read my post about the smoothest way getting you Windows app running too.

Today i uploaded a new version of my easyGIMPkit (at the moment german version only). This version brings typical templates for webpages and some more shortcuts like "Alt++" or "Al+-" to change the layer transparency.
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Today i released my easyGIMPkit. This first version is available only in german, an english version will follow soon.

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Wine 1.0 RC1 is now available for download. After 15 years of development it is planed to publish Wine on the 6th of June as final. Help the Wine project finding bugs and getting 1.0 stable.
Here is a short howto:

* Make sure Wine 1.0 RC1 and your favorite Windows app are installed
* Open a terminal and start your application with

env WINEPREFIX="~/.wine" wine "C:\Path\To\Your\app.exe"

* Check the output in the terminal and copy it per action via Ctrl+C into a text editor
(an example http://www.neeneenee.de/wine_photoline1451.txt)
* Go to the Wine bugtracker create a account or login
* First make sure the bug isn't submited yet
* If the bug exist create a comment and append a link to your textfile of the output

If you do not have any Wine experience check out my post "Getting your Windows app running on Linux in a easy way". You can tweak the Wine GUI too to give it a more Ubuntu styled look.

Here is the summary of my talk about WINE at the Ubuntu Hardy Heron release party Berlin. It includes all links and describes the best way getting an app like Photoshop running smooth.

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