What even is GTK2 and GTK3?
this post was submitted on 06 May 2024
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Gtk 2 is old, Gtk 3 current and Gtk 4 is new.
GTK is a UI toolkit, i.e. a piece of software that draws uniform-looking buttons and scrollbars and the like.
GTK used to stand for "GIMP toolkit" but GTK and GIMP development are now entirely separate, so much so, in fact, that 13 years after the release of GTK 3 and 3 years after the release of GTK 4, GIMP still hasn't upgraded to either.
Because it doesn't need anything in GTK 3 and 4. They're either cosmetic changes or UX changes and Gimp has no reason to adopt either.
GIMP has had a GTK 3 port in development for years. They just lack the developer bandwidth to finish it. And in general, using EOLed libraries for your very popular application is not great, not for security, not for usability, and not for compatibility with modern systems.
Man they're ahead of schedule, GTK3 isn't even obsolete yet
They're not yet switching to GTK3. They're backporting GTK3 features to GTK2.
Like Wayland? /sarcasm
Maybe have a look at the release notes: https://www.gimp.org/news/2024/05/05/gimp-2-10-38-released
Porting Wayland compatibility to GTK 2 would be incredibly out of scope for GIMP developers. :)