I assume "it looks AMAZING" is perfectly within the usual editorial standards of "omgbuntu", but wouldn't mind seeing a different headline here.
How about "it looks REASONABLY GOOD" or "it looks ABOUT LIKE YOU MIGHT EXPECT"?
How about "it looks REASONABLY GOOD" or "it looks ABOUT LIKE YOU MIGHT EXPECT"?
But relief and anticipation aside I have to agree with you that as far as aesthetics and design it is rather mediocre.
Edit: Did all of my downvote arrows disappear? I don't want to downvote anyone in particular here but that seems odd.
I can't say any of that, it's rude - but it's what I'm thinking.
Look at the right hand side - count the scrollbars, the dropdowns, the counters. What's that hideous layer control thing that's like a treeview/gridview with nested scrollbars sized to suggest it should be huge, crammed into a tiny little space? Grim.
Yes, its 100px wider, but still, imho Photoshop makes a lot better use of precious screen space. Compare the buttons under layer palettes. GIMP has 32px icons, while Photoshop has over 10px smaller ones. Or the slider, in Photoshop under "Navigator" and in GIMP in the Layers palette. Actually just compare Layers palettes in each. GIMP uses lots of superfluous labels and huge font size compared to Photoshop In my screenshot Photoshop also has 2 more palettes on screen.
Photoshops UI is also quite flexible, allowing to move and resize palettes freely, dock and undock, and group palettes to tab-groups. And layouts can be saved and then selected with just few mouse clicks. This allows it to scale across monitor size and count relatively easily.
edit: Sorry for inflammatory Photoshop vs. GIMP post