2012 - How do I paint?

[Rylos007]

I have not use Xnview in years. Maybe switching to linux so I thought I would try Xnview out again.

I downloaded the paint plugin an hour ago. It is in my plugins folder in Xnview. But there is no help anywhere that I can find on how to use it? The help files say nothing. Any posts on the forum are from 2007 or something. Read something about Modes for paint, but there is no modes in Xnview that I can see that I can change or adjust. Many posts about not being able to paint but they are old and use terms that apparently no longer exist such as add-ons, which I see no such thing in my file directory...

So, I guess I am pretty frustrated in just wanting to put a red circle on my screen shot and having wasted an hour of my time with a quick instal, a plugin, and still unable to do a simple paint? Is there something I should know that I am just failing to understand, that is not clear, not in the help files, not in the forums, that is just intrinsic for people to know that I am missing out on? It is not like I am a complete idiot...

How do I paint a red circle on an image?

[XnTriq]

It is in my plugins folder in Xnview.

Paint.xnp and Paint.lng belong in the AddOn folder.

To install, unzip the file to the Addon directory below the XnView directory.

After a restart of XnView, Paint (1.06) should show up in the Filter menu (View mode).

• FAQ: Let's talk about Plug-Ins... ...and AddOns

[Rylos007]

Thanks. The challenge is that there are a number of install files and they are not really clear in what you end up with. I had the small install. It is very difficult for one to find out what their problem is due to this install page and it's lack of clarity. How can one install one of a number of choices when the choices, at least to me, have no real explanation as to what one receives or gives up when making a choice.

[pic_viewer]

So Paint is a plug-in, which has to be put in the Add-On folder, to then show up in the program as Filter...notice something? For me everything currently found in the Filter menu is a 'Tool', and has nothing to do with what I expect as 'Filter'.

[Drahken]

The paint item is not a plugin, it's an addon. All the addons (ftp, zip, etc) all show up under the filters menu.

From what I can tell, "plugins" are for dealing with different filetypes, while "addons" are for additional functionality. (...And "adobe/photoshop plugins" are an entirely seperate thing.) Why addons are listed under filters is a bit of a mystery. (At least it makes sense for paint though, since your are changing the visual content of the image, much like you would if you were applying a smoothing filter or a color filter, etc. The ftp, zip, etc addons being listed under filters makes no sense at all.)


As far as the install versions:
It is kinda murky what the differences are, but you can reason out much of it if you look at the page closely. The "standard" version includes multiple languages and the jpeg2000 plugin. The "minimal" version is bare bones, including no extras except for french & german language files. The "complete" version includes most or all plugins, language files, and extra programs like xnconvert.
Because of the fact that it's difficult to tell exactly what comes with the larger packages, combined with the fact that I have no use for the extra languages, I prefer to grab the minimal version (zip version, not the installer), then grab the "all plugins" file, and whatever addons I want. With this method, I know exactly what I got, and where it is.