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This article is about font technology. For information about the typographic appearance of individual font sets, see Typefaces. In Typography, a typeface is a set of one or more Fonts designed with stylistic unity each comprising a coordinated set of Glyphs A typeface usually comprises

A computer font (or fount) is an electronic data file containing a set of glyphs, characters, or symbols such as dingbats. A data file is a Computer file which stores data for use by a computer application or system. A glyph is an element of writing Two or more glyphs representing the same symbol whether interchangeable or context-dependent are called Allographs the abstract unit they A dingbat is an ornament or spacer used in Typesetting, sometimes more formally known as a "printer's ornament" Although the term font once referred to interchangeable typefaces using mechanical components such as a typeball element or a daisy wheel, most modern fonts are used in computing. In typography a font (also fount) is traditionally defined as a complete character set of a single size and style of a particular Typeface. In Typography, a typeface is a set of one or more Fonts designed with stylistic unity each comprising a coordinated set of Glyphs A typeface usually comprises A daisy wheel printer is a printing technology which produces high-quality output comparable to that produced by high-end typewriters such as the IBM Selectric. There are three basic kinds of computer font file data formats:

Bitmap fonts are faster and easier to use in computer code, but inflexible, requiring a separate font for each size and each face. Outline and stroke fonts can be resized using a single font and substituting different measurements for components of each glyph, but are somewhat more complicated to use than bitmap fonts as they require additional computer code to render them. For example, the letter "A" has three components, the two lines on the outside and the bar between the two outside lines, and may have more if the design has serifs. Origins & etymology Serifs are thought to have originated in the Roman alphabet with inscriptional lettering —words carved into stone in Roman antiquity

Bitmap fonts versus outline fonts can be compared to the two main types of image file formats. Bitmap image formats such as Windows Bitmap (. The BMP file format, sometimes called bitmap or DIB file format (for device-independent bitmap) is an Image file format used to store bmp), Portable Network Graphics (. Portable Network Graphics ( PNG) is a bitmapped image format that employs Lossless data compression. png) and Tagged Image Format (. tif or . tiff), store the image data as a grid of pixels, in some cases with compression. Outline or stroke image formats such as Windows Metafile format (. Windows Metafile ( WMF) is a graphics file format on Microsoft Windows systems originally designed in the early 1990s wmf) and Scalable Vector Graphics format (. svg), store instructions of how to draw the image rather than storing the image itself.

A bitmap image can be displayed in a different size only with some distortion, but renders quickly; outline or stroke image formats are resizable but take more time to render as pixels must be drawn from scratch each time they are displayed.

Fonts are designed and created using font editors. A font editor is a class of Application software specifically designed to create or modify Computer font files Fonts specifically designed for the computer screen and not printing are known as screenfonts. A screenfont or screen font is a computer Typeface created specifically for reading from a screen; or

Contents

Font types

Bitmap fonts

An assortment of bitmap fonts from the first version of the Macintosh operating system.
An assortment of bitmap fonts from the first version of the Macintosh operating system. Mac OS is the trademarked name for a series of Graphical user interface -based Operating systems developed by Apple Inc

A bitmap font is one that stores each glyph as an array of pixels (that is, a bitmap). A glyph is an element of writing Two or more glyphs representing the same symbol whether interchangeable or context-dependent are called Allographs the abstract unit they In Digital imaging, a pixel ( pict ure el ement is the smallest piece of information in an image In Computer graphics, a bitmap or pixmap is a type of memory organization or Image file format used to store Digital images The It is less commonly known as a raster font. Bitmap fonts are simply collections of raster images of glyphs. In Computer graphics, a raster graphics image or bitmap, is a Data structure representing a generally rectangular grid of Pixels For each variant of the font, there is a complete set of glyph images, with each set containing an image for each character. For example, if a font has three sizes, and any combination of bold and italic, then there must be 12 complete sets of images.

Advantages of bitmap fonts include:

The primary disadvantage of bitmap fonts is that the visual quality tends to be poor when scaled or otherwise transformed, compared to outline and stroke fonts, and providing many optimized and purpose-made sizes of the same font dramatically increases memory usage. The earliest bitmap fonts were only available in certain optimized sizes such as 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 18, 24, 36, 48, 72, and 96 points, with custom fonts often available in only one specific size, such as a headline font at only 72 points.

The limited processing power and memory of early computer systems forced exclusive use of bitmap fonts. Improvements in hardware have allowed them to be replaced with outline or stroke fonts in cases where arbitrary scaling is desirable, but bitmap fonts are still in common use in embedded systems and other places where speed and simplicity are considered important.

Bitmap fonts are used in the Linux console, the Windows recovery console, and embedded systems. Linux (commonly pronounced ˈlɪnəks Microsoft Windows is a series of Software Operating systems and Graphical user interfaces produced by Microsoft. The Recovery Console is a feature of the Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 operating systems An embedded system is a special-purpose Computer system designed to perform one or a few dedicated functions often with Real-time computing constraints Older dot matrix printers used bitmap fonts; often stored in the memory of the printer and addressed by the computer's print driver. A dot matrix printer or impact matrix printer refers to a type of Computer printer with a print head that runs back and forth on the page and prints by impact striking In Computers, a printer driver or a print processor is a piece of Software that converts the data to be printed to the form specific to a printer Dot matrix printers are still used on carbon paper business forms. Carbon paper (originally carbonic paper) is Paper coated on one side with a layer of a loosely bound dry Ink or pigmented coating usually bound with Bitmap fonts may be used in cross-stitch. This article is about the embroidery style called cross-stitch or counted cross-stitch

To draw a string using a bitmap font, means to successively output bitmaps of each character that the string comprises, performing per-character indentation. Also true type fonts, bitmap fonts can be monospaced (i. TrueType is an Outline font standard originally developed by Apple Computer in the late 1980s as a competitor to Adobe 's Type 1 fonts e. . every character is plotted a constant distant from the previous character that it is next to, while drawing) or proportional (each character has its own width). However, the particular font-handling application determines how each font will be displayed.

Monochrome fonts vs. fonts with shades of gray

Digital bitmap fonts (and the final rendering of vector fonts) may use monochrome or shades of gray. Font rasterization is the process of converting text from a vector description (as found in scalable fonts such as TrueType fonts to a raster or Bitmap Monochrome comes from the Greek μονόχρωμος ( monochromos) meaning “of one color” which is a combination In Computing, a grayscale or greyscale Digital image is an image in which the value of each Pixel The latter is anti-aliased. In Digital signal processing, anti-aliasing is the technique of minimizing the distortion artifacts known as Aliasing when representing a high-resolution signal When displaying a text, typically an operating system properly represents the "shades of gray" as intermediate colors between the color of the font and that of the background. However, if the text is represented as an image with transparent background, "shades of gray" require an image format allowing partial transparency. Transparency is possible in a number of graphics file formats In Computer graphics, alpha compositing is the process of combining an image with a background to create the appearance of partial transparency

Scaling

Bitmap fonts look best at their native pixel size. In Digital imaging, a pixel ( pict ure el ement is the smallest piece of information in an image Some systems using bitmap fonts can create some font variants algorithmically. For example, the original Apple Macintosh computer could produce bold by widening vertical strokes and oblique by shearing the image. Macintosh, commonly nicknamed Mac is a Brand name which covers several lines of Personal computers designed developed and marketed by Apple Inc In Mathematics, a shear or transvection is a particular kind of Linear mapping. At non-native sizes, many text rendering systems perform nearest-neighbor resampling, introducing ugly jagged edges. More advanced systems perform anti-aliasing on bitmap fonts whose size does not match the size that the application requests. In Digital signal processing, anti-aliasing is the technique of minimizing the distortion artifacts known as Aliasing when representing a high-resolution signal This technique works well for making the font smaller but not as well for increasing the size, as it tends to blur the edges. Some graphics systems that use bitmap fonts, especially those of emulators, apply curve-sensitive nonlinear resampling algorithms such as 2xSaI or hq3x on fonts and other bitmaps, which avoids blurring the font while introducing little objectionable distortion at moderate increases in size. An emulator duplicates (provides an emulation of the functions of one System using a different system so that the second system behaves like (and appears to Pixel art scaling algorithms are Image scaling algorithms specifically designed to Upsample (enlarge low-resolution pixel and Line art Pixel art scaling algorithms are Image scaling algorithms specifically designed to Upsample (enlarge low-resolution pixel and Line art

A "trace" program can follow the outline of a high-resolution bitmap font and create an initial outline that a font designer uses to create an outline font useful in systems such as PostScript or TrueType. This article is about font technology For information about the typographic appearance of individual font sets see Typefaces A computer font (or PostScript ( PS) is a dynamically typed concatenative Programming language created by John Warnock and Charles Geschke in 1982 TrueType is an Outline font standard originally developed by Apple Computer in the late 1980s as a competitor to Adobe 's Type 1 fonts Outline fonts scale easily without jagged edges or blurriness.

Bitmap font formats

A bitmap color font for the Amiga OS.
A bitmap color font for the Amiga OS. AmigaOS is the default native Operating system of the Amiga personal computer

Outline fonts

Outline fonts or vector fonts are collections of vector images, i. The Glyph Bitmap Distribution Format (BDF by Adobe is a file format for storing Bitmap fonts The content is presented as a text file that is intended to be human Vector graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points lines, Curves and shapes or Polygon (s which are all based e. a set of lines and curves to define the border of glyphs. A glyph is an element of writing Two or more glyphs representing the same symbol whether interchangeable or context-dependent are called Allographs the abstract unit they Early vector fonts were used by vector monitors and vector plotters using their own internal fonts, usually with thin single strokes instead of thick outlined glyphs. Vector graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points lines, Curves and shapes or Polygon (s which are all based A plotter is a Vector graphics printing device that connects to a Computer. The advent of desktop publishing brought the need for a universal standard to integrate the graphical user interface of the first Macintosh and laser printers. Macintosh, commonly nicknamed Mac is a Brand name which covers several lines of Personal computers designed developed and marketed by Apple Inc A laser printer is a common type of Computer printer that rapidly produces high quality text and graphics on plain paper The term to describe the integration technology was WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get). WYSIWYG (ˈwɪziwɪg or /ˈwɪzɪwɪg/ is an Acronym for W hat Y ou S ee I s W hat Y ou G The universal standard was (and still is) Adobe PostScript. PostScript ( PS) is a dynamically typed concatenative Programming language created by John Warnock and Charles Geschke in 1982 Examples are PostScript Type 1 and Type 3 fonts, TrueType and OpenType. PostScript fonts are Outline font specifications developed by Adobe for professional digital typesetting, which uses PostScript file format to TrueType is an Outline font standard originally developed by Apple Computer in the late 1980s as a competitor to Adobe 's Type 1 fonts OpenType is a scalable format for Computer fonts initially developed by Microsoft, later joined by Adobe Systems.

The primary advantage of outline fonts is that they can be easily transformed by applying a mathematical function to each vector point, scaling them without causing pixellation. Outline font characters can be scaled to any size and otherwise transformed with more attractive results than bitmap fonts, but requires considerably more processing and may yield undesirable rendering, depending on the font, rendering software, and output size.

Outline fonts have a major problem, in that Bézier curves cannot be rendered accurately onto a raster display (such as most computer monitors and printers), and their rendering can change shape depending on the desired size and position. In the mathematical field of Numerical analysis, a Bézier curve is a Parametric curve important in Computer graphics and related fields [1] Measures such as font hinting have to be used to reduce the visual impact of this problem, which require sophisticated software that is difficult to implement correctly. Font hinting is the use of mathematical instructions to adjust the display of an Outline font so that it lines up with a rasterized grid Many modern desktop computer systems include software to do this, but they use considerably more processing power than bitmap fonts, and there can be minor rendering defects, particularly at small font sizes. Despite this, they are frequently used because people often consider the processing time and defects to be acceptable when compared to the ability to scale fonts freely.

Stroke-based font

A glyph's outline is defined by the vertices of individual strokes and stroke's profile. Its advantage over outline fonts include reducing number of vertices needed to define a glyph, allowing same vertices to be used to generate a different font that have different weight, glyph width, or serifs using different stroke rules, and the associated size savings. For font developer, editing a glyph by stroke is easier and less prone to error than editing outlines. Stroke-based system also allows rescaling glyphs without altering stroke thickness of the base glyphs. It is heavily marketed for East Asian markets for use on embedded devices, but the technology is not limited to ideograms. An ideogram or ideograph (from Greek idea "idea" + grafo "to write" is a Graphic symbol that represents an Idea

Commercial developers included Agfa Monotype (iType), Type Solutions, Inc. Monotype Imaging Inc is a Typesetting and Typeface design company ( Type foundry) responsible for many developments in Printing technology (owned by Bitstream Inc.) (Font Fusion (FFS), btX2), Fontworks (Gaiji Master), which have independently developed stroke-based font types and font engines. Bitstream Inc (NASDAQBITS is a Type foundry that produces digital Typefaces (fonts

Although Monotype and Bitstream have claimed tremendous space saving using stroke-based font on East Asian character sets, most of the saving comes from building composite glyphs, which is part of TrueType specification.

Font formats

Type 1 and Type 3 Fonts

Type 1 and Type 3 fonts were developed by Adobe for professional digital typesetting. PostScript fonts are Outline font specifications developed by Adobe for professional digital typesetting, which uses PostScript file format to Adobe Systems Incorporated (pronounced a-DOE-bee əˈdoʊbiː ( is an American Computer software company headquartered in San Jose California Using PostScript, the glyphs are outline fonts described with cubic Bezier curves. PostScript ( PS) is a dynamically typed concatenative Programming language created by John Warnock and Charles Geschke in 1982 In the mathematical field of Numerical analysis, a Bézier curve is a Parametric curve important in Computer graphics and related fields Type 1 fonts were restricted to a subset of the PostScript language, and used Adobe's hinting system, which used to be very expensive. Type 3 allowed unrestricted use of the PostScript language, but didn't include any hint information, which could lead to visible rendering artifacts on low-resolution devices (such as computer screens and dot-matrix printers).

TrueType Font

TrueType is a font system originally developed by Apple Computer. TrueType is an Outline font standard originally developed by Apple Computer in the late 1980s as a competitor to Adobe 's Type 1 fonts Apple Inc, ( formerly Apple Computer Inc, is an American Multinational corporation with a focus on designing and manufacturing Consumer electronics It was intended to replace Type 1 fonts, which many felt were too expensive. Unlike Type 1 fonts, TrueType glyphs are described with quadratic Bezier curves. It is currently very popular and implementations exist for all major operating systems.

OpenType Font

OpenType is a smartfont system designed by Adobe and Microsoft. OpenType is a scalable format for Computer fonts initially developed by Microsoft, later joined by Adobe Systems. Smartfont systems are font rendering systems that have advanced typographic features such as choosing the proper Glyph automatically Adobe Systems Incorporated (pronounced a-DOE-bee əˈdoʊbiː ( is an American Computer software company headquartered in San Jose California Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational Computer technology Corporation, which rose to dominate the Home computer OpenType fonts contain outlines in either the TrueType or Type 1 (actually CFF) format together with a wide range of metadata. PostScript fonts are Outline font specifications developed by Adobe for professional digital typesetting, which uses PostScript file format to

METAFONT

METAFONT uses a different sort of glyph description. Metafont is a Programming language used to define vector fonts. Like TrueType, it is a vector font description system. It draws glyphs using strokes produced by moving a polygonal or elliptical pen approximated by a polygon along a path made from cubic Bézier splines and straight line segments, or by filling such paths. Although when stroking a path the envelope of the stroke is never actually generated, the method causes no loss of accuracy or resolution.

See also

Notes

  1. ^ Stamm, Beat (1998-03-25). In Typography, a typeface is a set of one or more Fonts designed with stylistic unity each comprising a coordinated set of Glyphs A typeface usually comprises Typesetting involves the presentation of textual material in graphic form on Paper or some other medium. TeX (ˈtɛx as in Greek, often /ˈtɛk/ in English; written with a lowercase 'e' in imitation of the logo is a Typesetting system designed and mostly LaTeX (ˈleɪtɛ MetaPost refers to both a Programming language and the only known interpreter of the MetaPost programming language Year 1998 ( MCMXCVIII) was a Common year starting on Thursday (link will display full 1998 Gregorian calendar) Events 1199 - Richard I is wounded by a crossbow bolt while fighting France which leads to his death on April 6. The raster tragedy at low resolution.
  2. ^ http://stsf.sourceforge.net/about.html

External links

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