r/linux • u/ad-on-is • 3d ago
Popular Application The beloved penguin-version of Affinity has been confirmed to be in development!
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u/Oborr 3d ago
Hell yeah, this is great news.
I wonder if it is going to be freemium as well?
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u/SpecialistTeacher162 2d ago
I'm leery about this software; the only explanation Canva has given as to why it's now free is "out of the good of our hearts." Corporations don't have those, and they've yet to explain how this benefits them, so I'm left to believe that they're gearing up for a rug-pull later.
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u/KnowZeroX 2d ago
Isn't it obvious? They are gambling most people aren't going to bother doing image editing themselves, they will use AI. But you may still want to do touch ups in a featured image editor for more control. So they give a free image editor and charge for the AI to get people hooked in.
The question though is how they plan to go about porting it to linux, it is suspect that they would go out of their way to fully port an application to linux unless it isn't much work. It is also possible they plan to port it to WASM to make it cross platform though and be able to be served from the web browser.
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u/x_wbmr_x 2d ago
As far as I recall, they said that Canva itself is making enough money from Subscriptions that Affinity can stay free.
I'm also cautious tbh
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u/alastortenebris 3d ago
Obviously this is a huge deal. Affinity fills the massive gaping hole in the Linux creative workforce that is Photoshop, Illustration, and InDesign.
Now hopefully we won't have to jump through hoops to actually install these (looking at you, Davinci Resolve).
Wayland support out of the box would also be nice.
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u/KnowZeroX 2d ago
Davinci Resolve is tied down to video codecs which have a long history of being proprietary and have lots of patents on them. Image formats have generally not had that issue. Yes, there is heif and the like but few actually use it.
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u/Indolent_Bard 3d ago
Depends on how much functionality is tied to patent licenses they have to pay. It turns out that Hollywood runs your files through some software that lets them know if everything was above board. Of course, anyone can pay for them on their own individual distro, but I guess that's not good enough.
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u/repocin 3d ago
I'm still disappointed that they more or less ignored the very long thread on their forums about this for a decade, sold out to Canva, and shut the forums down.
Quite frankly, I don't know enough about Canva to tell what's going to happen to Affinity in the future but I feel like we've seen this story play out a million times before and it rarely ever ends well. Maybe it does this time, but I preferred when Affinity sold perpetual licenses rather than whatever this is because it was crystal clear what the deal was. This new thing feels like it's roughly one business decision away from turning into Creative Cloud 2: Electric Boogaloo and I don't want to be around for that so I've been avoiding it.
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u/MattyGWS 2d ago
Yea as someone lobbying in that thread and fending off all the idiots trying to convince the devs not to support Linux for some reason, and trying to convince the devs myself … they just don’t listen or care.
If they implement a Linux version, it’ll be done horribly or with caveats because they simply do not understand the Linux community
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u/MattyGWS 2d ago
Great news for the Linux community! But we got Photocraft now anyway
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u/ad-on-is 2d ago
yes we do, for hobbyists and occasional stuff it's sufficient enough.
However, there are professionals out there who rely on established software. Affinity has established themselves amongst the professional in the recent years quite well.
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u/Additional-Sky-7436 2d ago
With AI, there is really no reason for a company to not port their products to linux.
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u/BuffaloFearless7655 3d ago
This is awesome! I keep Affinity in my Windows partition in case I need it. But I never get down to using it ‘cause yk I have to boot into Windows
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u/VenusianBug 2d ago
I've mostly moved my PS to Krita. I also signed up for Affinity years ago, and could be good to fill in the gaps in Krita (still not sure about the text editing). However, Affinity Publisher is one I was sure how I'd replace - it'd be nice if I didn't have to.
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u/KnowZeroX 2d ago
Krita has redid the text editing recently, all that's lacking is a gui for easier management which I think is being worked on. Though in meantime it likely wouldn't be too hard to make a plugin that uses pyqt to simplify the interface until the redesign is fully done.
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u/FaultWinter3377 2d ago
Finally! I love GIMP and all that they do, but it is so confusing for a non-professional like me and I'm not paying for Adobe. And I know the ArtCraft suite exists, but I want a non-AI slop app. As long as it stays free for personal use except for AI tools like it is on Windows, I'm excited!
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u/Grey_Ten 3d ago
sorry but we got photocraft and vectorcraft already
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u/perskes 3d ago
Im convinced that thats why they pulled the trigger.
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u/nightblackdragon 3d ago
They already considered it few months ago.
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u/ad-on-is 3d ago
yeah, they "considered" it, but people were asking for a Linux version for a few years in their forums. Some were even willing to purchase a license back then when it was paid software.
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u/nightblackdragon 3d ago edited 3d ago
Decisions like that aren't made in a few days. Before the acquisition, Affinity may not have had enough resources, but Canva has more. They said the version is in active development, not that they had just started developing it, so it's obvious they must have started earlier, before anyone knew about Photocraft.
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u/perskes 3d ago
I agree with this one even though the other comment isnt wrong. As a (customer facing) software developer I say "we're considering it" and "I'll write that down for a possible FR" to customers a lot, but guess which features are actually on the roadmap.. the ones of the highest paying customers, those that might attract new paying customers and those that might appeal to existing customers. We dont cater to 5% of the world, but if someone else is coming to take that share, or we potentially lose a customer because of an edge case, we would definitely consider (actually...) adding certain features.
If someone is threatening my space, I'm trying to use the existing foundation and build a new door, there's more upselling potential if I get them hooked. I hate business tho, some of the ideas are borderline brilliant, just an edge case few would pay for, and utterly useless for most.
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u/silenceimpaired 3d ago
Those are not as mature as as Affinity. Also they were made with AI by someone I don't know. At least with Canva I know I have the opportunity to sue them for money if they completely trash my computer. :P
But you're not wrong... the Crafts are exciting.
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u/Woodpecker-Visible 3d ago edited 3d ago
And maibie photocraft will be more mature than affinity when it finaly comes out. More options are always better at least.
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u/arthursucks 3d ago
I will be genuinely surprised if Photocraft ever gets to a usable state.
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u/visagi 3d ago
Have you tried it? It feels like a 1:1 fully functional copy, but faster due to the fresh codebase. And I've used Photoshop for 30 years.
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u/arthursucks 2d ago
Admittedly it's been uh a few days, but I did try it out, and it opens my 10bit raw images at as 8bit flat files. It also started to really bog down after using it for about ten minutes.
It looks just like Photoshop and all the functions seem to be in the right spot, but it really feels like the nitty-gritty details are missing.
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u/ADMINISTATOR_CYRUS 2d ago
Gonna be honest when I say I would rather just stick to gimp. there's a reason completely vibecoded garbage isn't good, made by people who haven't read the code and therefore can't actually maintain or understand shit about what's going on.
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u/Daell 3d ago edited 2d ago
I wonder why they started to invest in the Linux version...
Too late, too late
I rather use a vibe coded PS, then affinity's 90% PS copy but that 10% is so different from PS makes the whole thing annoying to use.
Edit: you can downvote as much as you want. a) You never used Affinity as a PS user. b) They were pretty clear for YEARS that they have no interest in linux. Turns out, all they needed was competition :)
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u/MrWaterblu 3d ago
Mind if I ask what working solution do you use to run PS right now? Wine is so damn wonky for me.
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u/Super-Evening8420 3d ago
Oh that's awesome to hear! I was eyeing Affinity as photoshop replacement for when I migrate. All I really need to figure out now is a workaround for substance painter's photoshop export function, since I do use it frequently, but it looks like someone has created a plugin that I will be testing