NEWS.pre-2-4

                   ------------------------------ 
                   GNU Image Manipulation Program
                         Development Branch
                   ------------------------------

This used to be the development branch that lead to GIMP 2.4.


Changes in GIMP 2.4.0
=====================

- further improved the rectangle select and crop tools
- allow to mark out-of-gamut colors when doing a soft proof
- bug fixes


Changes in GIMP 2.4.0-rc3
=========================

- use the new format for storing recently used files
- added conversion options to the color profile conversion plug-in
- allow to disable the toolbox menu on all platforms
- further improved handling of the JPEG settings
- switch tabs when hovering over them
- added a PDB function to remove the alpha channel from a layer
- plug-in previews remember the state of the Preview checkbox (bug #478657)
- allow to grow the image/layer using the Crop tool
- bug fixes


Changes in GIMP 2.4.0-rc2
=========================

- more improvements and bug fixes in the rectangle tools
- antialias the display for zoom levels between 100% and 200%
- fix zoomed-out display problems
- improve handling of JPEG settings
- fix script-fu error reporting
- on OS X, get rid of menubars in windows and use the global menubar
- fix plug-ins using GimpZoomPreview
- throw properly catchable exceptions from foreign script-fu function
  (like PDB wrappers)
- bug fixes


Changes in GIMP 2.4.0-rc1
=========================

- further improvement to the Print plug-in
- completed the color management functionality for 2.4
- store JPEG setting with the image and use them when saving as JPEG
- further improved the rectangle tools, in particular handling of the
  fixed aspect ratio
- added color profile selector widget
- further improved the display quality for zoomed-out views


Changes in GIMP 2.3.19
======================

- support long layer names in PSD files
- improved EXIF handling in the JPEG file plug-in
- added control for the playback speed in the Animation Playback plug-in
- avoid needless image preview invalidation
- allow to edit the image comment in the Image Properties dialog
- further improved rectangle tools
- made JPEG save parameters user-configurable
- avoid color conversions between identical ICC color profiles
- improved Print plug-in
- improved loading and saving of indexed TGA images
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.18
======================

- temporarily show the hidden image statusbar while the progress is active
- added support for loading .abr v6 Photoshop brushes
- improved usability of color scales
- improved display quality of zoomed-out image view
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.17
======================

- improved import of multi-page TIFF files
- reduced rounding errors in Blur routines (core and plug-ins)
- further improved parameter checks in the PDB
- added support for loading .abr v2 Photoshop brushes
- improved border behavior of the Blur tool
- show the brush outline at the Clone tool's source position
- added libgimpbase API to retrieve the user's Pictures folder
- add a shortcut to the user's Pictures folder to the file-chooser dialog
- improved the quality of the Motion Blur filter
- save paths in TIFF files
- let the Screenshot plug-in name the new layer after the window
- use memory slices to reduce memory fragmentation
- some code cleanup
- lots of bug fixes


Changes in GIMP 2.3.16
======================

- make the XOR color configurable as a workaround for broken drivers
- allow to assign keyboard shortcuts to procedures without menu entry
- allow to configure the height of the preview area in data editors
- improved file detection in TGA plug-in
- improved brush scaling code, now also scales up
- converted standard pixmap brushes to parametric ones
- improved zoom tool behavior
- D-Bus methods now have a return value indicating success or failure
- added more menu tooltips
- allow procedures to request the display ID they are being called from
- depend on GTK+ >= 2.10.6 and use some of the new functions in GTK+ 2.10
- allow filename passed on the command-line to be opened as new images
- various optimizations
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.15
======================

- added keyboard control to rectangle tools and improved their tool options
- improved console handling on Win32
- support large XCF files (> 2GB) on Win32 also
- cleanup of the internal undo system
- ask before overwriting files, not only for image files
- added "Revert Zoom" functionality
- added GimpStringComboBox widget to libgimpwidgets
- added HAL support for hotplug of Linux Input devices
- added support for shaped windows to the Screenshot plug-in
- improved handling of incomplete PNG files
- categorize contributors into active and inactive
- added controller module for DirectInput controllers on Win32
- speed up transform tools
- improved tool cancellation framework
- fixed Select -> Border behaviour and added option for 'sticky image edges'
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.14
======================

- added actions to control brush spacing
- polished appearance of image window
- scale the brush's spacing when scaling the brush
- save tool presets when they are changed
- improved handling of vectors in the Python bindings
- allow for auto-cropping the result of the transform tools
- added GimpRatioEntry widget and use it in the rectangle tool options
- added functions to transform between preview and image coordinates
- added PDB functions to validate display, drawable, image and vectors IDs
- added HSL color model to Decompose and Compose plug-ins
- further improved status bar messages for tools
- on systems with D-Bus build gimp-remote functionality into gimp executable
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.13
======================

- show information about embedded color profiles in Image Properties dialog
- allow to apply color profiles on load (still work in progress)
- new vectors PDB API to replace the old path API
- added "Auntie Alias" plug-in for antialiasing on lineart
- added Edit->Fade operation
- added Rounded Corners option to Rectangle Select tool
- improved WinIcon plug-in (now loads and saves 24 bit and Vista icons)
- merged gimp-tiny-fu; replaces Script-Fu Scheme interpreter with TinyScheme
- remember unit and interpolation type in scale and resize dialogs
- changed default interpolation type to Cubic
- show comment in Image Properties dialog
- when loading in image as layers, don't merge the layers
- added experimental palette color selector module
- don't save thumbnails that don't match the image
- increased tool handle sizes for better usability
- implemented brush scaling from the tool options (only downscaling yet)
- import paths embedded into TIFF files
- support vectors in the Script-Fu and Python-Fu user interfaces
- added PDB functions to retrieve position of layers/channels/vectors
- added side pane with table of contents to the Help Browser
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.12
======================

- merged the Perspective Clone tool
- allow to pan the image view using the Space bar
- show a thumbnail in the "Rotate JPEG?" query dialog
- added file information to the Image Properties dialog
- more work on the new selection tools
- give immediate feedback when tool modifier keys are pressed
- added Lens Distortion plug-in
- internationalize Python binding and Python plug-ins
- improved internal message infrastructure, use the statusbar for warnings
- added an URL loader backend based on libcurl
- build a color-managed CMYK color selector if lcms is available
- localize Script-Fu procedure descriptions
- lots of user interface polishing
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.11
======================

- depend on newer versions of glib, gtk+ and pango and use some of the new
  features in these libraries
- made Ctrl-P the default shortcut for Print
- show progress when loading/saving XCF files
- added support for 16/32 bit bitmaps and alpha channel to the BMP plug-in
- if possible, detect the number of CPUs
- allow to disable the build of the Script-Fu extension
- many improvements to the Python bindings and the pygimp user interface
- made message dialogs transient for the progress window
- added PDB API for creating a selection from vectors
- further improved status bar messages for tools
- derive ByColorSelect and FuzzySelect tools from a common base class
- finer control over select-by-color functionality
- minor optimizations in the drawing code
- abstract brush outline drawing into the common base class GimpBrushTool
- store sample points in XCF files
- added extended PDB API for selection procedures
- added convenience API to libgimp that creates a layer from a GdkPixbuf
- added midpoint handles to Scale tool for scaling with fixed width or height
- let color picker tools select a matching color in the Palette Editor
- allow to use foreground and background color in gradients
- added first draft of a new Healing Brush tool
- abstract clone tool functionality into the common base class GimpSourceTool
- improvements to the new selection tools
- don't wake up the gimp every so often
- added GimpHintBox widget to libgimpwidgets
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.10
======================

- added support for a registration color in the Decompose plug-in
- the Align tool now also aligns to guides
- allow use of CSS color notation in Script-Fu
- more work on the new selection tools
- let Fractal Explorer work on grayscale and give it a larger preview
- speed up Value Invert plug-in
- added strong undo/redo functions bound to Shift-Ctrl-[ZY]
- use radio items for the image mode menu
- applied Tango style on the default iconset
- added plug-in for colormap manipulation
- allow plug-ins to register in Layers, Channels, Vectors and Colormap dialog
- added load plug-in to open desktop links
- removed print plug-ins and started work on a replacement using the 
  new GTK+ Print API
- added replacements for gimp_foo_select widgets, akin to GimpFontSelectButton
- introduced translation context to a number of colliding strings
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.9
=====================

- better interpolation for "smooth" curves in the Curve tool
- added an Auto button to the Threshold tool that picks a suitable value
- simplified user installation, only display a dialog in case of an error
- added Red Eye Removal plug-in
- added thumbnail loader to GIF load plug-in
- declared even more data as const
- refactoring of the PDB and plug-in management code
- allow Merge to work on a single layer
- added a way to remove all keyboard shortcuts from the Preferences dialog
- added menu items for "Text to Path", "Text along Path" and "Text to
  Selection"
- allow to initialize a new layer mask with any of the image's channels
- added clipboard brush and clipboard pattern
- added scripts to sort color palettes
- swap meanings of "dilate" and	"erode" which have been wrong for a long time
- show Clone tool source location while painting
- use GtkFileChooserButton in place of GimpFileEntry
- added script to reverse the order of layers
- added "Sample merged" and "Selected Pixels only" options to Palette import
- added actions to select palette and colormap colors
- new environment variable to control which batch interpreter to use
- give plug-ins access to the CPU detection so that they can use MMX code
- speed up Selective Gaussian Blur plug-in
- improved tool cursors, added edge resizing cursors
- improved behaviour of new selection tools
- allow to reset all gimprc values from the Preferences dialog
- optionally show guides in the Crop tool
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.8
=====================

- added new tile primitive Triangle to Mosaic plug-in
- speed up Gaussian Blur plug-in
- suppress redundant progress updates from plug-ins
- changed some gimprc and sessionrc default values (window hints,
  fullscreen mode)
- do not focus transform tool dialogs on map
- renamed Magnify tool to Zoom tool and added some missing tool shortcuts
- added a submenu with recently used plug-ins to the Filters menu
- fixed look-up table used for Contrast adjustments
- improved the user interface of the Animation Playback plug-in
- added framework for describing menu entries in the statusbar
- added lots of helpful blurbs to procedures and core actions
- remove color from the Watercolor selector if Shift is being pressed
- ported PDB internals to GParamSpec and GValue
- speedup and UI improvements for the SIOX tool
- added parasite getters and settors for vectors
- made PSD load and save plug-ins 64bit clean
- some string review
- ported ellipse select tool to the new rectangle tool
- added basic support for layer masks to the PSD save plug-in
- avoid relocations by declaring more data as const
- new application icons in more sizes and as a SVG
- provide script-specific samples instead of hard-coding "Aa" for font preview
- build the Screenshot plug-in on all platforms
- allow to discard invisible layers when merging visible layers
- nicer output from gimp-procedural-db-dump
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.7
=====================

- depend on GTK+ 2.8, use some of the new features
- removed workarounds for problems in GTK+ 2.6
- moved Align Visible Layers to the Image menu
- started to add a new vectors PDB API
- make it more obvious that docks can be rearranged by drag and drop
- modified the behaviour of the Tab key
- added --license command-line option
- improved dither matrix for RGB->Indexed conversion
- added PDB API to stroke with any paint method
- gave some plug-ins more sensible names
- keep settings of brush/pattern/font/... button popups across sessions
- reduced number of memory allocations by declaring some strings as static
- some improvements to the plug-in preview widgets
- added links to important topics in the user manual
- let the configure script display a summary of options
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.6
=====================

- even faster application startup
- binary relocatibility on Linux by means of binreloc
- be more verbose when being asked for it
- select color index when picking from an indexed drawable
- allow to migrate windows between displays
- mouse-wheel scrolling and zooming in plug-in previews
- added keyboard shortcuts ([ and ]) for changing the brush radius
- improved Oilify plug-in
- made the IWarp plug-in preview resizeable
- added alignment mode for cloning from a fixed location source
- completed core/ui separation of paint tools and paint methods
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.5
=====================

- optionally add jitter to paint strokes
- implemented Snap to Path
- added PDB API to access the Image Grid
- ease access to Keyboard Shortcuts editor
- optimizations to the Tile Cache and Undo/Redo implementations
- more work on the Buffer PDB API
- bug fixes to the new zoomable plug-in previews
- optimization of the SIOX algorithm
- menu reorganisation in the Toolbox menu
- export "Open As Layer" to the PDB as file-load-layer
- added keyboard control for the Curves tool
- load and save embedded ICC profiles from/to PNG images
- improved appearance of some tool icons on dark background
- added PDB API to get and set path visibility
- let data editors follow the active brush, palette and gradient (optional)
- some rearrangements in the new toplevel Colors menu
- speed up reloading of data files
- allow to copy the location of data files to the clipboard
- allow to disable saving of the document history in the preferences
- slightly faster application startup
- more use of ngettext for plural forms
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.4
=====================

- allow plug-ins and scripts to register menu entries in the <Brushes>,
  <Gradients>, <Palettes>, <Patterns> and <Fonts> menus
- replaced Selection to Brush/Pattern scripts with scripts that paste
  a new brush/pattern from the content of the clipboard
- allow to easily close all opened images
- added a first version of a Print plug-in using libgnomeprint
- improved Sphere Designer plug-in
- improved Compose plug-in
- added a zoomable preview widget for plug-ins
- implement copy and paste of paths as SVG 
- use new stock icons introduced with GTK+ 2.6
- allow to zoom in/out using the +/- keys on the numerical keypad
- make it easier to drop dockables below the toolbox
- set plug-in dialogs transient to the window they have been called from
- added PDB function to obtain handles to the image and progress windows
- export named buffers to the PDB
- easier access to the popup menu in empty container views
- use ngettext for plural forms
- implement "Sample Merged" for the Clone tool
- various Win32 fixes
- fixed capitalization for better HIG compliance
- use a descriptive verb instead of "OK" as button label in most dialogs
- redone About dialog to be more informative
- take the default unit from the locale settings
- moved color-related tools and plug-ins to a new toplevel Colors menu
- let the gnomevfs plug-in use GNOME authentication manager if available
- rewritten Crop tool (work in progress)
- added page selector to the Postscript Import plug-in
- added preview to Checkerboard and Threshold Alpha plug-ins
- more PDB procedure and parameter name canonicalization
- touched up new path tool cursors and added one for the Join operation
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.3
=====================

- improved new GimpPageSelector widget
- minor improvements to the Procedure and Plug-In browsers
- set alternative button order in some places that were missed earlier
- added SIOX algorithm for foreground extraction
- fixed most gcc 4.0 warnings
- improved Cursor view and Sample Points functionality
- prepared code and UI for more layer lock types
- added new PDF import plug-in based on libpoppler
- undeprecated and improved palette editor, added cursor navigation
- show more information in the Image Properties dialog
- added prototype of SIOX foreground selection tool
- fixed build of MMX code on gcc 4.0
- moved procedure browser to libgimpwidgets as GimpProcBrowserDialog
- canonicalize PDB procedure and parameter names
- use the coefficients from the sRGB spec when calculating luminance
- allow to remove alpha channel from a layer
- added more different cursors for the paths tool
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.2
=====================

- more standard way of dealing with translation of the startup tips
- allow to use the selected font in the text tool's text editor
- some minor UI changes for HIG compliance
- redid the framework that deals with installing desktop files
- started to reorganize menus, mainly plug-ins and scripts
- renamed "Scatter RGB" and "Scatter HSV" to "RGB Noise" and "HSV Noise"
- allow to clear the document history
- don't normalize the result in the Laplace plug-in (bug #306874)
- ported FractalExplorer GUI to GtkTreeView, getting rid of the last
  XPM icons that were being used
- added an option to Motion Blur to blur outwards
- added support for the proposed ICC Profiles In X Specification
- added new widget GimpEnumLabel to libgimpwidgets
- let the lcms display filter module show information about the used
  color profiles
- improved drawing of the brush outline
- fixed build of Python language binding on Win32
- allow plug-ins to access the user's color management configuration
- added new widget GimpPageSelector to libgimpwidgets
- reenabled the Debug menu
- load and save ICC color profiles from/to JPEG images
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.1
=====================

- allow to copy and paste SVG between GIMP and other applications
- added a utility for testing and debugging clipboard operations
- more work on the new vectors PDB API
- made screen edges active in the image display in fullscreen mode
- made file and color selection dialogs transient to their parent windows
- moved browser widget from Procedure Browser plug-in to libgimpwidgets
- allow more search types in the Procedure Browser
- reduced size of the Colors dockable by moving the hex entry down
- added object properties to GimpColorArea and GimpColorButton
- changed default for RGB->Indexed conversion to not to any dithering
- allow to paste a new image using Ctrl-V on the toolbox
- show previews of dash presets in Stroke Options dialog
- Escape key cancels the window selection in the Screenshot plug-in
- allow to operate the Brightness Contrast tool by clicking and dragging
  on the canvas
- improved Sample Points dockable
- added first draft of new align tool
- turned image and drawable combo boxes in libgimpui into real widgets
- further improved Python bindings
- nicer DND icons for viewables
- allow to hide the button-bar found at the bottom of most dockables
- turned font selection in libgimpui into a real widget
- added support for BMP files with alpha channel (RGBA)
- bug fixes and code cleanup


Changes in GIMP 2.3.0
=====================

- added Recompose plug-in
- added rectangle tool in GFig plug-in
- improved palette editor color DND
- improved EXIF handling in JPEG plug-in
- smoother autoscrolling in image display
- added Snap to Canvas Border and Snap to Path (yet unimplemented)
- added previews to Mosaic, Pixelize and Sparkle plug-ins
- added Lanczos interpolation method
- added Open as Image menu entries to brushes and patterns dialogs
- improved drag-n-drop of drawables within GIMP
- added a prototype of a new rectangular select tool
- moved a bunch of enums from core into libgimpbase
- moved GimpConfig functionality from core into libgimpconfig
- moved GimpEnumStore and GimpEnumComboBox to libgimpwidgets
- moved convenience constructors for property views to libgimpwidgets
- ported ImageMap plug-in to action based menus.
- first steps towards color management
- use GOptionContext for command-line parsing
- added a gnome-vfs backend for the uri plug-in (former url plug-in)
- prepared code for accessing remote files in the file-chooser
- let all dialogs obey the gtk-alternative-button-order setting
- extended GimpProgress PDB API
- improved file type handling in file save dialog
- resurrected threaded pixel processor and enable it by default
- parallelized a few more internal functions
- speed up gradient dithering
- improved PSD save plug-in
- improved Python bindings
- allow to resize layers with the image
- allow to control letter spacing in the text tool
- added path-on-path functionality, use it to implement Text on Path
- improved gradient editor
- allow to import paths from a string
- ported all code to gstdio wrappers
- added infrastructure for color sample points
- added first draft of a metadata editor plug-in
- speed up burn compositing function
- added Altivec versions of some compositing functions
- added PDB API to control the number of columns in a palette
- allow to control hue overlap in Hue-Saturation tool
- added a PDB API to register menu branches
- added missing mnemonics
- improved Screenshot plug-in
- allow to drag brushes/patterns/gradients... to the selectors in Script-Fu
- allow to save images by dragging them to a filemanager that supports the
  XDS protocol
- optimizations in the Color Deficiency display filter
- transfer the clipboard content to a clipboard manager on exit
- moved cursor info out of the Info window into a dockable
- moved remaining bits of the Info Window to a new Image Properties dialog
- build and install gimp-console by default
- allow to drag and drop image data into GIMP
- use the statusbar more to display hints and info about the tool state
- resurrected --no-data functionality
- zoom to the cursor position instead of the display center
- some improvements to the Helpbrowser plug-in
- load PS brushes in the .abr format
- allow to choose between different algorithms for Desaturate
- added thumbnail loader to Winicon plug-in
- improved configuration of input controllers
- added an option to make the dock windows transient to the active image display
- lots of code cleanup and bug-fixes