Krita 2.4 on Windows: pros and cons

[Boudewijn Rempt]

On Tuesday 19 July 2011 Jul, Ramón Miranda wrote:
> I agree with David
> " For Beta tester volunteers only : a first unstable beta version of
> Krita forWindows is out. Not suited for production ...etc.... "
> 

Yes, that's the stage we're in. As Sven says, waiting for Krita to become as stable as Corel Painter -- wait, Corel Painter isn't stable either. As stable as Photoshop will mean we'll never release. But when we release our first version of Windows, we'll be sure to label it as completely experimental. But I think we're now at a stage where having an experimental version available on Windows is good for the project.

"Krita windows" is the most popular search for Krita. To me that means that there are many people who are into alternatives and experiments, people who are already looking beyond the usual crop of Windows-based apps, and I am confident that they will understand the limitations of Krita on Windows. 

I'm also not totally convinced that the failure of the Gimp project to attract active community members from the Windows world proves that it cannot be done. As Cyrille says, that's a social problem, and I think that we can handle that if we're just honest, open and friendly. (And of course, the Gimp project makes significant income from their Windows user base -- it would be enough to have several students work on Krita as a part-time job.)

> anyway how much users are reporting bugs to Krita devs? and how many people
> are using Krita ? and for which tasks exactly? maybe it would be interesting
> to know this kind of things.

I don't have numbers :-). Having a windows installer that's downloadable from a KO server means we at least can track download numbers, but for now, I'd say it's not that many. But for the project, I don't think that gaining a large number of silent users is a major goal at this point (though I'm pleased as punch every time I see someone post something cool made with Krita on DeviantArt), I want to grow our active community.

After 2.4 has been released, so starting in 2012, I think we'll see our silent user group grow a lot, and that might create a situation where we cannot handle the bug reports easily by ourselves. By then, I hope we'll have grown enough that someone steps up as our community manager, like Lydia has done for Amarok.

-- 
Boudewijn Rempt
http://www.valdyas.org, http://www.krita.org, http://www.boudewijnrempt.nl