Sunday, March 20, 2011
To all of you who downloaded the 32-bit Gimp 2.7.2 from this website, I owe you an apology. I forgot to include a crucial DLL - Python27.dll which is usually installed in the Windows\System32 directory. Considering that Python 2.7.1 was already installed on my machine, Windows found the DLL and did not complain. Naturally, if you didn't have Python 2.7.1 installed, it would complain quite loudly. Thus I could not replicate the problem and hence the delay in finding a solution. Thanks to everyone who downloaded and patiently explained the problems to me with pictures all :). Anyway, please download the zipfile (see sidebar) and unzip it into the following directory: C:\Program Files\gimp-2.7.2\python. Once you do that, please Start Gimp and you should see the python console by clicking on Filters -> Python-Fu -> Console. Here is a screenshot of what it should look like ...
Sorry about that.
Some of you have asked about the visual appearance of the application when you install Gimp on your machine. Well, the issue is that Gtk+ is not using the MS-Windows theme. You can get the Windows "Look-and-feel" by adding the following line
to the file - "C:\Program Files\gimp-2.7.2\etc\gimp\2.0\gtkrc. However, a word of caution; If you do inplement it, you will lose the ability to use the text tool because of this bug. Of course, you are free to use other Gtk+ themes freely.
There is a whole lot of discussion on these builds on GimpChat.
Monday, March 14, 2011
I received word that people are having trouble with the 64-bit version. I discovered that the 64-bit zipfile did not have the correct pygimp.interp file. I have now included another version with the current upload. Apologies for all the trouble and hope this solves the issue with the python interpreter. Please download the current version and let me know how it goes. Thanks to everyone who downloaded and patiently explained the problems to me.
Sunday, March 13, 2011
As promised, I finally put up the compiled versions of Gimp 2.7.2. It took me awhile to set up the 32 bit environment to compile the 32 bit version. It was tricky to say the least. First, note that in the last few days the Glib version requirement has changed. Now, you need version 2.28. The 2.28 windows binaries are available and so that part was easy. However, the 64-bit 2.28 are not available for download and so I downloaded the source and compiled it myself.
Well, turns out, that was the easy part. I had some trouble with both the 32-bit and the 64-bit compilations.
Gimp 2.7.2 64/32-bit Compilation
The current git-master has had some changes and so the plugin file-jpegs no longer compiles. I posted a note to this effect on the Gimp-devel list. If anyone has a solution to this, please let me know. I am able to compile the latest git-master without libjpeg. So, it is not my setup which is the issue, I think. So, right now what you see is the source from March 5. However, I think for the purposes of testing, it should be sufficiently recent. I will continue to investigate in the meantime and hope that there will be a response to my post on the mailing-list.
As far as the 32-bit compilation is concerned, I didn't have any trouble with plug-ins/file-jpeg. However, I could no longer compile with lcms1! So, Again, I had to redo the compilations by excluding lcms. I will try to update when this is fixed.
Another caveat was that I was hoping to use the modifications to some of the native Gimp plugins that were made by PhotoComiX who sent me his hacks to these plugins. Some of you probably know him as aregular fixture on both the flickr Gimp group and the Gimp registry. I did incorparate them into the tree and built the source. However, the 64-bit Gimp did not compile and I am looking into it. It did however, compile for the 32-bit. So, folks using the 32-bit installation will see the large preview windows in some of the plugins.
Caveats
Currently Gimp 2.7.2 does not exactly compile on Windows due to a Windows resource issue. If you try to compile you get an error stating that there is no rule to make gimp-2.7.rc.o. I have filed a bug report on this. In the meantime, I had to remove all references to rc.o makes in all the makefiles under the Gimp 2.7.2 tree. Then Gimp does compile and I am able to use it.
Installation
Well, as I said before, I did not create an installation or a setup program to install this on your system. Note that this is cutting edge, and those who are willing to test it would have to get their hands dirty so to speak. So, here is the manual installation procedure. Download the zip file for your system. Please download the 64-bit zip if you are using Window 7, 64 bit. You can download the 32-bit but then you will have to modify the python interpreter and the default environment. So, you might as well stick to the 64-bit version where it should be easier. once you download, please unpack to the directory "C:\Program Files\". Once you do that, you can create a shortcut on your desktop for gimp-2.7.exe in the gimp-2.7.2\bin directory. I also provided an icon that you can attach to the shortcut. The only caveat is that you cannot right-click a picture and select gimp-2.7.exe from the drop-down menu since the program is not registered in the Windows registry. You can however, keep Gimp open and then drag and drop pictures on it. One more thing, it you notice that Gimp is not starting properly, you have to add gimp-2.7.2/bin to your environment variables. So, open computer -> System Properties -> Advanced system Settings -> Environment Variables. Find the path variable and click to edit it. Add the following to the beginning of the box, "C:\Program Files\gimp-2.7.2\bin;". Don't add the quotation marks, but don't forget the semi-colon in the end.
Well, that is it. Let me know if it does not work for you. Check out this screenshot with the new splash screen!
As mention before, One of the reasons for wanting to use 2.7.2 is that the text tool is broken in Gimp 2.7.1. The other reason is if you have 8G RAM, then you need the 64-bit version. Also, we have nice tools like the cage transform tool, which should replace the iwarp tool for sure. Anyway, give it a try, you will like it. However, see also the discussion on this here.
If you wish to use the official version then Gimp 2.7.1 is available from here.
