Updating the vision

[Boudewijn Rempt]

On Wed, 26 Jul 2017, Thorsten Wilms wrote:
> 
> 
> As many here will probably understand, optimization for frequent, prolonged
> high-intensity use will lead to, as far as necessary:
> - valuing efficiency in the long run over being obvious initially
> - basic tools and options being harder to find simply due to being among many
> others
> - some coarse and simple things appearing harder to accomplish, because
> operations and options are fine grained for flexibility
> 
> Regarding those questions, you may have to add that Krita is not a clone of
> another application, but an independent design (even if taking inspiration
> from elsewhere, as one should!).
> 
> How much of that belongs in a vision statement, though?

Well, we originally came up with this vision statement line by line in a 
discussion with Peter Sikking: 

http://blog.mmiworks.net/2010/03/working-on-vision-with.html

Every bit has a special, focused reason for being in there, but things
have changed. We started with:

what is it, who is it for and where is the value?

So that's something we should keep. 

> Anyway, an attempt:
> 
> "
> Krita is a digital painting application for demanding needs. It is Free
> Software, developed by, with and for artists.

Demanding needs" is a very good addition.

> 
> Optimized for frequent, prolonged and intense use, it offers a rich palette of
> tools and options. It is not designed for short, one-off image editing tasks.
> 
> Krita supports creating digital images from scratch. It explicitly supports,
> but is not limited to: illustrations, concept design, textures, matte
> painting, comics and animations.
> "
> 
> 
> Notes:
> 
> I guess KDE and being cross-platform doesn't necessarily belong here.

We originally put KDE in because we wanted to make clear that KDE is our tribe,
it's where we come from and where we are home. That's still true, but I'm no
longer convinced it's part of the vision.

> I did not mention performance, efficiency or being "snappy". As much thought
> and hard work those take, they are weak goals, because the opposites make no
> sense. One may aim to develop something simple, with only few features over
> something full-featured, but who would want to write a slow, sloppy
> application? But perhaps something along the lines of "Krita supports the
> artist in staying focused and working efficiently." might help.

True -- but one thing in that last paragraph really has given us a lot of guidance,
and that the focus on worflow and getting out of the way. Back then, focus
on snappy was important, too, because Krita was quite slow compared to what it is now.

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