6 ms·
Pity that they don't open source it. I've gone through multiple image editors on Linux, and none of them have the simplicity of Paint. The layout and functional
by AdmiralAsshat 9y ago
Pity that they don't open source it. I've gone through multiple image editors on Linux, and none of them have the simplicity of Paint. The layout and functionality is incredibly intuitive. You drop someone into Paint, and even if they've never seen it before, they can start doing stuff within a minute or so. You drop the same person into GIMP, and five minutes later they're still trying to figure out how the hell to select a paintbrush.
I understand that every image editor is trying to compete with Photoshop, but sometimes I don't need Photoshop. I just need to paste my clipboard so that I can crop, circle something, or annotate with some text and a crudely drawn arrow. There really is nothing else comparable that can do that as quickly or as easily as Paint.
- jb55 9y ago> I've gone through multiple image editors on Linux, and none of them have the simplicity of Paint Have you tried mypaint?
- rockinghigh 9y agoThese basic image highlighting features are so useful that Apple made them available in the Mail app (https://support.apple.com/en-us/ht204093 https://support.apple.com/en-us/ht204093).
- mlvljr 9y agoMight be in the old leaked Win 2000 source pack, though :)
- ProAm 9y agoPinta has always been my simple go to image editor on linux. Similar to Paint.NET
- simon83 9y agoI just wanted to add that Pinta 1.6 (which is the current stable version in the official Arch repos, for example) has awfully slow rectangle/selection tools on larger images. In my case, selecting something in a 2000x2000 image would freeze the whole program for a couple of seconds. Same with resizing or dragging a selection. It was pretty much useless. But 1.7 fixes this issue. It's a development version and not considered "stable" yet (though I haven't experienced any issues so far).
- sametmax 9y agoPinta is pretty close to paint on linux but yeah, "it's not paint"
- emilsedgh 9y agohttps://www.kde.org/applications/graphics/kolourpaint/ https://www.kde.org/applications/graphics/kolourpaint/
- AdmiralAsshat 9y agoThanks, I'll give it a look. I'm a little hesitant about grabbing a KDE app on my Cinnamon desktop, as it will inevitably result in pulling down like 50 KDE libraries. But we'll see.
- keithpeter 9y agoperhaps use apt-get kolourpaint --no-install-recommends or similar? Warning: I have not tried this, but it might cut down the KDE library count (e.g. just why does Krita need a phonon back end dependency?)
- smcl 9y agoI think a few people (some non-KDE users) have an aversion to KDE/Qt tools and avoid them where possible. Certainly it was enough of a pain for me to get consistent look-and-feel across all my applications that I gave up and decided not to use Qt if I could avoid it.
- the_common_man 9y agoI have found kde tools have much more functionality. Gtk based tools generally do a free things and do them well.
- sangnoir 9y ago> I think a few people (some non-KDE users) have an aversion to KDE/Qt tools and avoid them where possible. Why would you have an aversion to Kolourpaint but not to a Linux port of MS Paint? That does not make sense in the context of this thread - unless your comment was a non-sequitur. Edit: After rereading, I have realized the root of the thread can be interpreted in other ways than what I got - I felt AdmiralAsshat's main thrust was they'd have wanted a Linux port of MS Paint.
- cr0sh 9y agoFor those who remember the Amiga's Deluxe Paint, there's this one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GrafX2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GrafX2
- simooooo 9y agoThere is a tool called windows ink that lets you do pretty much that
- vxNsr 9y agoIt doesn't though, it takes a screengrab of your current window and let's you annotate, but only if it's a win32 app or UWP not the win8 apps. I just ran into this issue last night (to be fair snipping also doesn't work).
- frik 9y agoAn identical open source Paint re-implementation is available on ReactOS, the free open Windows re-implementation: http://www.ReactOS.org http://www.ReactOS.org You can download it from the package manager, and use it on Windows or Wine too. (Maybe WineHQ ships it as well)
- vram22 9y agoHow stable is ReactOS, and does it have a fairly good set of features for a desktop OS? Had read about it earlier, never tried it out.
- restalis 9y agoReactOS may have its issues, but the (Ms)Paint implementation in ReactOS that frik is talking about is pretty stable. And open-source: https://svn.reactos.org/svn/reactos/trunk/reactos/base/applications/mspaint/ https://svn.reactos.org/svn/reactos/trunk/reactos/base/appli...
- vram22 9y agoGood to know ...
- Sylos 9y agoIf you've gone through so many image editors on Linux, why would you choose GIMP to compare it to? That's the prime example of an image editor that aims to be like Photoshop. Just about any other image editor on Linux is easier to use.
- LeifCarrotson 9y agoReposting/editing my deeper comment. But if you want to specifically do screenshots, try Greenshot: http://getgreenshot.org/ http://getgreenshot.org/ https://github.com/greenshot/greenshot/ https://github.com/greenshot/greenshot/ It's open-source. The built-in image editor is optimized for the things that you need to do with screenshots - it is comparable, but almost in the wrong direction: Things are easier and quicker with Greenshot than Paint! Here's a quick guide I threw together: https://i.imgur.com/tcpZjG0.png https://i.imgur.com/tcpZjG0.png Yes, it runs on Windows, but so does Paint. They have a Mac version (never tried it, apparently it was a near-complete rewrite), but not a Linux version: http://getgreenshot.org/faq/will-there-ever-be-a-greenshot-version-for-linux-or-mac/ http://getgreenshot.org/faq/will-there-ever-be-a-greenshot-v...
- slantyyz 9y agoI'd like to also chime in on how great Greenshot is. I started using Greenshot after Skitch got EOL'ed, and while it's not perfect, I find it indispensable for sharing screenshots with coworkers.
- msla 9y agoI was about to suggest XPaint as being equally simple, but it might be more complex than I thought: > Recent versions have support for advanced image manipulations (image zooming and resizing, filters, color modifications, separation of RGB channels), scripting, layers, edition of alpha channel and of transparent images, vector formats import, truetype fonts and anti-aliasing, geometric transformations of such fonts, etc. … > The scripting capabilities include programmable filters, batch processing, creation of 2D and 3D images, etc. XPaint also recently acquired a built-in editor which can be used to produce posters containing text and images. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XPaint https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XPaint
- peyotestatue 9y agoXPaint used to be decent, but at some point it got really buggy. You have to save after every operation in case it crashes. Someone ought to go to town on it with valgrind or whatever.
- throwaway7645 9y agoWhat you're saying you use mspaint for i use greenshot and it is much better, while still being tiny and lightweight.
- zeptomu 9y agoYou may also try Krita - I think it's pretty well done.
- gregmac 9y ago> I just need to paste my clipboard so that I can crop, circle something, or annotate with some text and a crudely drawn arrow. There really is nothing else comparable that can do that as quickly or as easily as Paint. I use Greenshot for this use case. It's faster than Paint at everything you mentioned, better at screenshots, has some nice tools like highlight and obfuscate, and one-click export/upload for a bunch of services (eg to Imgur).