alt Hacker NewsHow much in tokens/Claude subs would it cost to make a paint.net open source clone?
Seems like the kind of software that with enough tokens an agent would be able to create from scratch autonomously (because you have a clear goal and reference)
I'd guess with 5 max subs running fable 5.1 almost non stop it should be doable in a couple of weeks.
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keithnz • today at 7:36 PM
I think it's roughly possible for any piece of software. I think the problem would be how long it would take to polish it afterwards. I think it would be an interesting experiment to run an AI only open source project though. Not sure cloning another paint program is really worth the effort however.
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The author says it's about 700k LoC that he's worked on for 20 years.[1] I don't know how many tokens that arrives at, but that seems non-trivial.
[1] https://simonwillison.net/2026/Sep/2/rick-brewster/