Create ICNS (icons for Mac) on GIMP

It's official! Gimp supports ICNS! 

Well, it's not yet officially "official".  But beta build of Gimp already supports ICNS file format.

Yes, the file format for icons that Mac OS uses.

Open, Create, Edit ICNS with Gimp 2.99.14 (the beta build I tested it on).  As of posting, official Gimp is at 2.10-32.

It will also tell you if your icon size is supported or not! Sweet!  No need to check the internet if a size is supported.

So, I created ICNS for Kage Studio with Gimp 2.99.  I tested 16x16, 18x18, 24x24, 32x32, 36x36, 48x48, 64x64, 128x128, 256x256, and 512x512.

It was unreal using Kage Studio to create the icon for Kage Studio.  Then exporting the Kage Studio icon from Kage Studio to PNG which Gimp obviously supports.  Then use Gimp to downscale from high resolution to all the dimensions that ICNS supports.

Not sure who to credit for supporting the file format, maybe everyone on the ticket that was raised 2 years ago by cardcraft, that was finally closed just 3mos ago.

I so love Free and Open Source Software.  What a time to be alive.

~creek23

Gimp 2.8 gzdirect problem

This simple solution should fix the problem: "The procedure entry point gzdirect could not be located in the dynamic link library zlib1.dll."

To non-programmers, this error message simply means that your  zlib1.dll is outdated and needs to be replaced.

Somehow, most (if not all) Gimp plugins are using gzdirect which is supposed to be available on  zlib1.dll.

Try checking C:\Windows\System32\ and look for zlib1.dll then rename it to something else, maybe something like  zlib1.dll.old.

So where to get the latest one?  It's actually installed along with Gimp 2.8, but since you have another  zlib1.dll on your Windows' System32 path, Windows is trying to load that copy instead of the copy that Gimp 2.8 has.

Now, re-run Gimp 2.8.

Happy Gimping!

Getting Started with GTK on Windows

I am assuming that you already know GTK+ and wanted to try it out for the first time. This article will discuss how to setup your development environment to start writing GTK+ based applications.

First things first, download everything you need.

Download GTK from GTK.org -- I downloaded gtk+-bundle_2.18.7-20100213_win32.zip.

Optionally, download libiconv from GTK.org -- as of this writing libiconv is version 1.9.1.

For C editor, I am using MinGW Developer Studio. It is the easiest to setup in compiling GTK+ applications since it already works well with MingGW, the recommended toolchain when using GTK. Sadly, the developer's website is somewhat down or possibly currently doing a revamp. But you can easily get version 2.0.5 from list of mirrors courtesy of TextEditors.org.

Setting them up

Install MinGW Developer Studio.

Extract gtk+-bundle_2.18.7-20100213_win32.zip then place content in C:\Gtk+\{here}

Same with libiconv, extract libiconv-1.9.1.bin.woe32.zip then place all contents in C:\Gtk+\{here}

Configuring MinGW Develop Studio.

1. Launch the editor
2. Click Edit -> Options... to open the Option dialog box.
3. Click the Directories tab
4. On Show directories for,
• select Include files then add the following paths:
  
  
  
  • C:\Gtk+\include
  • C:\Gtk+\lib\glib-2.0\include
  • C:\Gtk+\lib\gtk-2.0\include
  • C:\Gtk+\include\cairo
• select Library files then add this path:
  
  
  
  • C:\Gtk+\lib

Testing it out.

1. Launch MinGW Developer Studio
2. Click Project -> New Project to open New dialog box.
3. Select GTK+ Application and indicate HelloGTK as Project Name
4. Click OK to create new project.
5. Click File -> New to open New dialog box.
6. Select C/C++ Source File and indicate hellogtk.c as File name.
7. Click OK to create new file.
8. Type in the code below then press F5 to compile and run the program.

If you are having problem running you hellogtk application, you might need to install GTK+ runtime. I use GIMP, which installs the runtime -- try to download and install a copy of GIMP for Windows.

Where to go from here? Read the official documentation and tutorials.