How to install Pinta on Ubuntu 20.04 – A free drawing and image editing Tool

Pinta is a free and open source application modelled on Windows app Paint.NET for image editing and bitmap image drawing. It’s an cross-platform application available for Microsoft Windows, Linux, BSD and Mac OS X. You can use Pinta in your language. Pinta is at least partially translated into over 55 languages.

This application does comprise some interesting features including drawing tools, effects to spice up your images, colour adjustment tools and image filters. You can use layers to help separate and group elements of your image for easy editing.

It supports most major image formats including PNG, BMP, ICO, JPEG, TIFF, TGA, OpenRaster(.ora). It also includes blend modes, shapes, text, freehand drawing, image effects, photo filters etc. Basic drawing is ensured by a library of freehand, lines, rectangles, ellipses and plenty other similar tools. Separate and regroup sections of your image as fast and easily as possible.

Key Features of Pinta

• Free and Open-Source
• Easy to use
• Unlimited undo/redo history.
• Nice set of drawing tools and photo effects
• Multiple language support.
• Extension manager.
• Flexible toolbar arrangement, including floating as windows or docking around the image edge.

This article explains three methods of installing Pinta on Ubuntu 20.04.

Choose the installation method that is most appropriate for your environment.

Method 1: Installing Pinta as a Snap Package

The easiest way to install Pinta on Ubuntu 20.04 is by using the snap packaging system.

A snap package is a type of universal Linux package that you can enjoy irrespective of the distro. Its an self-contained software packages that include the binary all dependencies needed to run the application.

All you need is the snap service pre-configured, In the case of Ubuntu 20.04, it comes with snap pre-installed.

If snapd package is not already installed then you can install it by running following command.

$ sudo apt install snapd

Note: Snap packages can be installed from either the command-line or via the Ubuntu Software application.

This is actually the Snap version of the Pinta. It can be used on any Linux distribution that has Snap support.

Open your terminal (Ctrl+Alt+T) and type the following command to install the Pinta package.

$ sudo snap install pinta

At this step, you have successfully installed Pinta on Ubuntu 20.04 system.

If you are not comfortable with the command line, open Ubuntu Software, search for “Pinta” and install the application.

Type the following command to update Pinta package.

$ sudo snap refresh pinta

Method 2: Installing Pinta via PPA Repository

If you want to install the most recent version of Pinta, you can use the PPA repository.

Personal Package Archives (PPA) are software repositories designed for Ubuntu users and are easier to install than other third-party repositories. PPAs are often used to distribute pre-release software so that it can be tested.

Step #1

First of all open the terminal from system application launcher and type the following command to add the Pinta PPA to your system.

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:pinta-maintainers/pinta-stable

Step #2

Then, execute the following commands to install Pinta package on your Ubuntu system.

$ sudo apt update && sudo apt install pinta

Once installed, launch it from your system application menu.

Method 3: Installing Pinta via Flatpak

Before installation let’s understand what is Flatpak.

What is Flatpak?

Flatpak is basically a framework for the applications on Linux. With the different distributions preferring their own package management, Flatpak aims at providing a cross-platform solution with other benefits.

It makes the work for developers even easier. A single application build can be used in almost all the Linux distribution (that support Flatpak) without any modification to the bundle.

Ubuntu has Flatpak supported by default. However, you can verify it by trying to install Flatpak again.

$ sudo apt install flatpak

You can also use the official PPA to install Flatpak. Open a terminal and use the commands below.

$ sudo add-apt-repository ppa:alexlarsson/flatpak
$ sudo apt update
$ sudo apt install flatpak

Once Flatpak is installed type the following command to install Pinta.

$ flatpak install flathub com.github.PintaProject.Pinta

Then execute the below command to run the Pinta application.

$ flatpak run com.github.PintaProject.Pinta

That’s It.

Starting Pinta

Pinta can be launched from the command line by typing pinta or In the Activities search bar type “Pinta” and click on the icon.

Pinta User Interface:

How to Uninstall Pinta from Ubuntu 20.04

For some reason, If you want to uninstall Pinta, refer following methods.

Method #1

If you have installed Pinta via Snap type the following command:

$ sudo snap remove pinta

Method #2

If you have installed the Pinta application through PPA then uninstall it by following one of the below procedures.

Procedure #1

It’s most likely that you added the PPA using add-apt-repository command. You can use the same command to remove the PPA as well. Just give it --remove option in the command.

$ sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:pinta-maintainers/pinta-stable

Note: Use this procedure only if you need to remove the PPA and not the applications installed by it.

Procedure #2

You must have noticed that in the above procedure we only talked about deleting or removing a PPA. What about the applications installed using these PPAs? Will they be removed as a result of removing the PPA? The answer is NO.

So this is when ppa-purge comes in picture. It not only disables the PPA but also uninstalls all the programs installed by the PPA or revert them to original version provided by your distribution.

So type the following command to install the ppa-purge package and uninstall the Pinta package.

$ sudo apt install ppa-purge && sudo ppa-purge ppa:pinta-maintainers/pinta-stable

Method #3

If you have installed the application via Flatpak run the below command:

$ flatpak uninstall com.github.PintaProject.Pinta

Conclusion

I hope that now you have a good understanding of How to install Pinta on Ubuntu 20.04 LTS Focal Fossa.

If anyone does have any questions about what we covered in this guide then feel free to ask in the comment section below and I will do my best to answer those.