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- <th colspan="3" align="center" id="chaptername">Chapter 2. Using <span xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" class="acronym">Gimp</span></th>
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- <td width="20%" align="left"><a accesskey="p" href="ch02s04s13.html">Prev</a> </td>
- <th width="60%" align="center" id="sectionname">5. Files</th>
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- <div>
- <div>
- <h2 class="title" style="clear: both"><a id="gimp-using-fileformats"></a>5. Files</h2>
- </div>
- </div>
- </div>
- <a id="id3426149" class="indexterm"></a>
- <p>
- The GIMP is capable of reading and writing a large variety of
- graphics file formats. With the exception of GIMP's native XCF
- file type, file handling is done by plug-ins. Thus, it is
- relatively easy to extend GIMP to new file types when the need
- arises.
- </p>
- <p>
- Not all file types are equally good for all purposes. This part
- of the documentation should help you understand the advantages and
- disadvantages of each type.
- </p>
- <div class="simplesect" lang="en" xml:lang="en">
- <div class="titlepage">
- <div>
- <div>
- <h3 class="title"><a id="id3426181"></a>Opening Files</h3>
- </div>
- </div>
- </div>
- <p>
- There are several ways of opening an existing image in GIMP:
- </p>
- <div class="itemizedlist">
- <ul type="disc">
- <li>
- <p>
- The most obvious is to open it using a menu, by choosing
- <span class="guimenu">File</span>-><span class="guimenuitem">Open</span>
- from either the Toolbox menu or an image menu. This brings
- up a File Chooser dialog, allowing you to navigate to the
- file and click on its name. This method works well if you
- know the name of the file you want to open, and where it is
- located. It is not so convenient if you want to find the
- file on the basis of a thumbnail.
- </p>
- </li>
- <li>
- <p>
- If instead of a file name, you have a URI (i.e., a web
- address) for the image, you can open it using the menu, by
- choosing
- <span class="guimenu">File</span>-><span class="guimenuitem">Open Location</span>
- from either the Toolbox menu or an image menu. This brings
- up a small dialog that allows you to enter the URI.
- </p>
- </li>
- <li>
- <p>
- If the image is one that you previously created using GIMP,
- perhaps the easiest way to open it is from the menu, using
- <span class="guimenu">File</span>-><span class="guimenuitem">Open Recent</span>.
- This gives you a scrollable list of the images you
- have most recently worked on in, with icons beside them.
- You need only select the one you want, and it will be
- opened.
- </p>
- </li>
- <li>
- <p>
- If you have associated the file type of the image with GIMP,
- either when you installed GIMP or later, then you can
- navigate to the file using a file manager (such as Nautilus
- in Linux, or Windows Explorer in Windows), and once you have
- found it, double-click on the icon. If things are set up
- properly, this will cause the image to open in GIMP.
- </p>
- </li>
- <li>
- <p>
- Alternatively, once you have found the file, you can click
- on its icon and drag it into the GIMP Toolbox. (If instead
- you drag it into an existing GIMP image, it will be added to
- that image as a new layer or set of layers.)
- </p>
- </li>
- <li>
- <p>
- For many applications, you can click on a displayed image (a
- full image, not just a thumbnail) and drag it into the GIMP
- toolbox.
- </p>
- </li>
- <li>
- <p>
- Also for many applications, if the application gives you a
- way of copying the image to the clipboard, you can then open
- the image in GIMP by choosing
- <span class="guimenu">File</span>-><span class="guisubmenu">Acquire</span>-><span class="guimenuitem">Paste as New</span>
- from the Toolbox menu. Support for this is somewhat
- variable, however, so your best bet is to try it and see
- whether it works.
- </p>
- </li>
- <li>
- <p>
- You might want to take a look at a program called
- <span class="application">gthumb</span>, an image-management
- application that in several ways nicely complements GIMP.
- In <span class="application">gthumb</span>, you can cause an image
- to open in GIMP either by right-clicking on the icon and
- selecting GIMP from among the list of options, or by
- dragging the icon into the GIMP Toolbox. See the <a href="http://gthumb.sourceforge.net" target="_top">gthumb home page</a>
- for more information.
- Other similar applications :
- <a href="http://gqview.sourceforge.net" target="_top">gqview</a>,
- <a href="http://perso.wanadoo.fr/pierre.g/xnview/enhome.html" target="_top">xnview</a>
- </p>
- </li>
- </ul>
- </div>
- <p><a id="gimp-file-open-by-extension"></a>
- When you open a file, using the File menu or any other method,
- GIMP needs to determine what type of file it is. Unless there
- is no alternative, GIMP does not simply rely on the extension
- (such as ".jpg") to determine the file type, because extensions
- are not reliable: they vary from system to system; any file can
- be renamed to have any extension; and there are many reasons why
- a file name might lack an extension. Instead, GIMP first tries
- to recognize a file by examining its contents: most of the
- commonly used graphics file formats have "magic headers" that
- permit them to be recognized. Only if the magic yields no
- result does GIMP resort to using the extension.
- </p>
- </div>
- <div class="simplesect" lang="en" xml:lang="en">
- <div class="titlepage">
- <div>
- <div>
- <h3 class="title"><a id="gimp-export-dialog"></a>Saving Files</h3>
- </div>
- </div>
- </div>
- <a id="gimp-export-confirm-dialog"></a>
- <div class="informalfigure">
- <div class="mediaobject">
- <img src="../images/using/export-dialog-en.png" />
- <div class="caption">
- <p>The Export dialog</p>
- </div>
- </div>
- </div>
- <p>
- There is no file format, with the exception of GIMP's native <a href="go01.html#gimp-xcf-save">XCF</a> format, that is capable of
- storing all the data in a GIMP image. When you ask to save an
- image in a format that will not completely represent it, GIMP
- notifies you of this, tells you what kind of information will be
- lost, and asks you whether you would like to "export" the image in
- a form that the file type can handle. Exporting an image does not
- modify the image itself, so you do not lose anything by doing
- this.
- </p>
- <div class="note" style="margin-left: 0.5in; margin-right: 0.5in;">
- <table border="0" summary="Note">
- <tr>
- <td rowspan="2" align="center" valign="top" width="25">
- <img alt="[Note]" src="../images/note.png" />
- </td>
- <th align="left">Note</th>
- </tr>
- <tr>
- <td colspan="2" align="left" valign="top">
- <p>
- When you close an image (possibly by
- quitting GIMP), you are warned if the image is "dirty"; that is,
- if it has been changed without subsequently being saved. Saving
- an image in any file format will cause the image to be
- considered "not dirty", even if the file format does not
- represent all of the information from the image.
- </p>
- </td>
- </tr>
- </table>
- </div>
- </div>
- </div>
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- <td width="40%" align="right" valign="top"> 6. Working with Digital Camera Photos</td>
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