What Is GIMP?

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GIMP is an acronym for General Image Manipulation Program. As we already mentioned, GIMP is an open source software application and is available free of charge. It was originally a project of Spencer Kimball and Peter Mattis, two students who were undergraduates at the University of California, Berkeley, when they created GIMP. It began as a project for one of their classes. They actually started out to write a LISP compiler. Frustration with the project caused the two students to move in a new direction. They decided to write an image manipulation project in C. The result has quickly grown into a full-fledged image editing program. As of this writing, GIMP releases are being orchestrated by Manish Singh. You can find out more on the history, current status, and future of GIMP by going to www.gimp.org. You can also download your own copy of GIMP for Linux or for Windows from this Web site.

GIMP is a complete, fully functional graphics program. It is on a par with Adobe Photoshop and shares many features with that product. GIMP enables you to do professional-level graphics manipulation. It is ideal for a graphic artist, advertising professional, or any person that needs top-quality graphics. In this chapter we will examine using GIMP and walk you through the basics. If you followed the installation instruction in Chapter 2, “Installing Linux,” then GIMP is already on your PC. If you did not, you can use the Packages option to add GIMP, or you can download it from the GIMP site.

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