Well, there are shapes, sort of, Filters>Render>Gfig. There are also Paths, which will do a lot of what you want. You can also create Paths in Inkscape and then import them into Gimp (which I find handy, since Inkscape has more features for dealing with paths than Gimp does). Converting paths to selections would do things like putting a picture in a shape. You can also merge them, sort of, by converting to a selection, merging, then converting back to a path. I don't think it is quite as accurate as something like Inkscape for boolean stuff, but it works. You can also edit the nodes on the paths.

Further, you can, if you know enough about what you are doing, write script-fu's that could create various path shapes if you want. I know of at least one script fu that will do a path in the shape of a circle. Surely if that is possible, then any other shapes would be, as well.

Spell check? Seems a bit overdone. If you are doing that much text in Gimp that you need to do spell checking...seems like another sort of app would be more appropriate, such as Scribus or, as you mention, Open Office.

I can see where you are coming from on your last thing, with the docking. However, remember that Gimp is originally a Linux application, and the Linux desktop has various options which would make things a bit easier to do the back and forth thing, such as virtual desktops and window shading.

Still, of all the features you mention, I think that one might have some merit. It coule be implemented as a tabbed feature in one of the dialogs. Wonder if one could write a plugin to do this sort of thing? (I am not a programmer, so I have no idea if such a thing would be possible, but it is an interesting possibility).

--- Jason Thompson wrote:

I like to see shapes added to Gimp as of way of Openoffice draw and or Dia Diagram Editor...
Where you can Draw Shapes, Select thickness of Shape, outline and color, Merge shapes, edit points on shapes, insert a outside picture in shape. The whole kit and kaboodle.....Cad like options. Is there a way where you can work in collaboration with OpenOffice..... add a spell check in Gimp with dictionary look up in text editor?...

Docking options of the menu options to picture so at time it seems like I an dealing with pile of cards. Left or right side muti-picture window docking which opens various pictures into same window workspace for fast back and forth editing.

Mask saving option...copying mask from one picture to save to use on another picture. Ability to load and move mask around freely.

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...forgot something...you can load a file into Gimp's text option. So what's to prevent editing your text in something that does have spell checking and then just loading the file?

--- Jason Thompson wrote:

I like to see shapes added to Gimp as of way of Openoffice draw and or Dia Diagram Editor...
Where you can Draw Shapes, Select thickness of Shape, outline and color, Merge shapes, edit points on shapes, insert a outside picture in shape. The whole kit and kaboodle.....Cad like options. Is there a way where you can work in collaboration with OpenOffice..... add a spell check in Gimp with dictionary look up in text editor?...

Docking options of the menu options to picture so at time it seems like I an dealing with pile of cards. Left or right side muti-picture window docking which opens various pictures into same window workspace for fast back and forth editing.

Mask saving option...copying mask from one picture to save to use on another picture. Ability to load and move mask around freely.

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