Note that there are a ton of ways to grab screenshots on linux that don't require you to start gimp. (I'm assuming you're using linux since you mentioned gimp; yes I know it runs on other platforms, but those platforms also have other, much easier ways to capture screenshots). On linux workstations I usually have one of those quake-console things so I hit whatever key combination triggers it (on my mac it's double-ctrl, brings down iterm 2 window). From any console you can use the "import" command (part of imagemagick package). This lets you grab the whole screen, a single window, or an arbitrary rectangle. `import foo.png` Gnome has its own screenshot tool, and there are likely dozens of other packages that do the same thing.