Paint.net (stylized as Paint.NET or paint.net) is a freeware
raster graphics editor
A raster graphics editor is a computer program that allows users to create and edit images interactively on the computer screen and save them in one of many raster graphics file formats (also known as bitmap images) such as JPEG, PNG, and GI ...
program for
Microsoft Windows
Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...
, developed on the
.NET Framework
The .NET Framework (pronounced as "''dot net"'') is a proprietary software framework developed by Microsoft that runs primarily on Microsoft Windows. It was the predominant implementation of the Common Language Infrastructure (CLI) until bein ...
. Paint.net was originally created by Rick Brewster as a Washington State University student project, and has evolved from a simple replacement for the Microsoft Paint program into a program for editing mainly graphics, with support for
plugins
Plug-in, plug in or plugin may refer to:
* Plug-in (computing) is a software component that adds a specific feature to an existing computer program.
** Audio plug-in, adds audio signal processing features
** Photoshop plugin, a piece of software t ...
.
History
Paint.net originated as a computer science senior design project during spring 2004 at Washington State University. Version 1.0 consisted of 36,000 lines of code and was written in fifteen weeks. In contrast, version 3.35 has approximately 162,000 lines of code. The paint.net project continued over the summer and into the autumn 2004 semester for both the version 1.1 and 2.0 releases.
Development continues with one programmer who worked on previous versions of Paint.net while he was a student at WSU. As of May 2006 the program had been downloaded at least 2 million times, at a rate of about 180,000 per month.
Initially, Paint.net was released under a modified version of the MIT License, with the exclusion of the installer, text, and graphics. However, citing issues with the open source code being plagarized by others that had rebranded the software as their own and bundled user content without their permission, the availability of the source code was restricted, in December 2007 Brewster announced his intent to restrict access to components of the program (including its installer, resources, and user interface). In November 2009, the software was made