paint.net 4.3.3 alpha build 7988

[Rick Brewster]

This build has a bunch of bug fixes and small improvements, and the app has been migrated to .NET 6 which has a lot of performance improvements that Paint.NET benefits from.

 

NOTE for Windows 7, Windows 8.1, and 32-bit/x86 users: Paint.NET v4.3.x will be the last release(s) that work on Windows 7, Windows 8.1, or on any 32-bit/x86 version of Windows. It has become significantly more difficult and time consuming to support these lately, not very many people are using them, and I can no longer justify the cost and frustration of keeping support for these afloat. Starting with Paint.NET v4.4, only Windows 10 and 11+ will be supported, and only on 64-bit (x64 and ARM64). Once Paint.NET v4.3.3 is released, I will start working on v4.4 and will only release v4.3.x updates on an as-needed basis and only until v4.4 is completed.

 

Get the update

To get this update, make sure you have "Also check for pre-release (beta) versions" enabled in Settings, and then click on the Check Now button. (Unfortunately alpha/beta releases are not currently available for the Microsoft Store version of the app).

You can also download the installer directly: https://www.getpaint.net/files/zip/test/paint.net.4.303.7988.35971.install.anycpu.web.zip

 

Offline installers, portable ZIPs, and MSIs for deployment can be found over at the GitHub releases page.

 

Changes since v4.3.2:

• New: The app has been migrated to .NET 6, which has resulted in improved rendering and startup performance
• Improved: The download size is now much smaller for ARM64 by about 33%
• Improved various UI elements for Dark Theme, e.g. scrollbars and drop-down lists (Windows 10 v1809+ only)
• Fixed the way various UI controls look on Windows 11, e.g. buttons and dropdown lists
• Fixed the View -> Zoom to Window command when using the keyboard shortcut (Ctrl+B), which was resetting instead of toggling the zoom level
• Fixed a rendering bug in the Dents and Polar Inversion effects, which was reported over at https://forums.getpaint.net/topic/118746-paintnet-update-changed-the-way-the-dents-distortion-filter-works-causing-unwanted-artifactsglitches-was-this-an-intended-change/
• Fixed a memory leak with the selection renderer, which would cause gigabytes of GPU memory usage and crashes
• Fixed some GDI object leaks, which would eventually result in a crash
• Fixed a crash while drawing a selection, right clicking on the History window without releasing the left mouse button, and then clicking to redo a history entry
• Fixed an issue that was preventing new plugins from loading their native DLL dependencies as specified in their .deps.json file
• Fixed the app itself crashing after an effect crash is trapped and when you choose to restart the app
• Fixed a text rendering bug in some parts of the UI, as reported by @midora over at https://forums.getpaint.net/topic/118866-paintnet-43-footnote-of-indirectui-control-in-filetype-shows-artifacts-after-scrolling/
• Fixed the "untitled:" file name argument prefix, which was preventing Window Clippings from being able to send screenshots
• Changed: The /createMsi command for the installer has been removed. Instead, you can now download the MSIs directly from the GitHub releases page.
• Fixed a few issues when using the MSI directly. The execution context was fixed, and it will no longer delete the desktop shortcut or Start Menu shortcut if executing the MSI for a second time.
• Fixed some registry keys that were not being deleted during uninstall 
• Improved performance during the "extracting" stage of the installer by migrating away from NSIS. This has also helped improve compression, although other changes have resulted in a net increase in the download size (but with improved performance for the app).
• Updated the bundled AvifFileType plugin to v1.1.16.0 (thanks @null54!)

 

Enjoy!

[Rick Brewster]

So long Windows 7, you were a great OS!

 

As for Windows 8.1 ... ehh ...

[lynxster4]

Holy cow @Rick Brewster!  I don't know if it was even a second!  I also opened a 30MB PDN file and it was also instantaneous.

That's some great startup performance.

[Rick Brewster]

1 hour ago, lynxster4 said:

Holy cow @Rick Brewster!  I don't know if it was even a second!  I also opened a 30MB PDN file and it was also instantaneous.

That's some great startup performance.

 

More startup performance improvements are on the way. Once this bug in .NET is fixed https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/issues/61471 I can compile the ReadyToRun images with AVX2 support, and once this bug is fixed https://github.com/dotnet/runtime/issues/61544 I can use something called "composite" mode. Those two together should get another ~10% improvement.

[BDP]

Installed the update - Windows 10 Pro 64-bit. No problems, no errors in plugins. Thank you

 

Brian

 

[Pixey]

19 hours ago, Rick Brewster said:

To get this update, make sure you have "Also check for pre-release (beta) versions" enabled in Settings, and then click on the Check Now button.

 

This did not work for me this morning when I was using 4.303.7988.12281.

 

So I used the link you provided to directly install it, and this time it took 8 minutes to install from my download folder 😬 My poor computer, and it's only 4 years old 🙃

[Rick Brewster]

1 hour ago, Pixey said:

 

This did not work for me this morning when I was using 4.303.7988.12281.

 

 

I had a typo in the update manifest, the version # was wrong, so your previous 4.3.3 alpha couldn't see the new version. Oops

[Rick Brewster]

7 hours ago, Pixey said:

So I used the link you provided to directly install it, and this time it took 8 minutes to install from my download folder 😬 My poor computer, and it's only 4 years old 🙃

 

When you say it took 8 minutes to install, you mean it spent 8 minutes in the setup UI with the Paint.NET logo? If so, which part did it spend a lot of time in? "Preparing", "Removing old version", "Installing", or something else?

[Pixey]

50 minutes ago, Rick Brewster said:

If so, which part did it spend a lot of time in?

 

Between the "removing previous installation" and the final stage.

[midora]

I'm really happy about the dark sliders in dark theme. 🙂

I could no longer reproduce the drawing artifacts in footnotes and links.

[user.by]

i have a suggest, so is it can be new version number 5 or 6 if we are use with .NET 5 or .NET 6. 

[AndrewDavid]

Quote from @Rick BrewsterAug 26

"Major version bumps like that are good for when there are new features, UI redesigns, etc. This update is primarily a technology upgrade and performance optimization release, and there aren't really any new end-user features."

 

[Rick Brewster]

2 hours ago, user.by said:

i have a suggest, so is it can be new version number 5 or 6 if we are use with .NET 5 or .NET 6. 

 

This has been suggested a handful of times by various people. It's not a good idea.

 

Paint.NET's version is not linked with .NET's. Bumping the version number to 6 would not convey the correct magnitude of changes from the last version.

[_koh_]

Maybe not worth reporting, but when I updated from 4.3.2 yesterday, auto update stuck at "unpacking and validating"-ish phase, so I had to cancel it.

I remember progress bar showing 0% while text saying 99%.
Then I tried Check Now button, and this time it worked.

[osyu]

Form background color is now globally gray (at least on Win10) instead of white as it was in 4.3.2 and earlier, is this intentional?

 

Diag info attached.

diag.txt

[midora]

Personally I would increase the major version number just because it's easier to tell users that version 5 no longer supports Windows 7 (instead to mention version 4.4). But it's not really important.

[toe_head2001]

44 minutes ago, osyu said:

Form background color is now globally gray (at least on Win10) instead of white as it was in 4.3.2 and earlier, is this intentional?

 

Yes, that was a deliberate change.

 

45 minutes ago, osyu said:

 

 

There is a bug in your screenshot though.  The top part of the NumBox controls are getting clipped, resulting in a shorter control.

[osyu]

17 hours ago, toe_head2001 said:

Yes, that was a deliberate change.

Any chance there could be an option in settings to toggle it back? It looks odd, especially in menus.

 

17 hours ago, toe_head2001 said:

There is a bug in your screenshot though.  The top part of the NumBox controls are getting clipped, resulting in a shorter control.

Yeah I noticed that (as well as the brush width dropdown being wider) but I assumed it was just a quirk from the control changes for Win11.

Edited November 17, 2021 by osyu

[Rick Brewster]

10 hours ago, osyu said:

Any chance there could be an option in settings to toggle it back? It looks odd, especially in menus.

 

Yes it's intentional. It's just using the same color that Windows uses for dialog backgrounds now. I'll be making any changes if I get enough feedback to warrant it; so, feedback received, not ignored, but for now the plan is to keep it as-is.

 

 

[Rick Brewster]

New update posted: