{{Short description|Software library for font rasterisation and rendering}} {{Infobox software | name = FreeType | developer = David Turner, Robert Wilhelm, Werner Lemberg<ref name="osnews-dt-interview">{{cite web | url = https://www.osnews.com/story/18166/Interview-with-David-Turner-of-Freetype/ | title = Interview with David Turner of Freetype | date = June 28, 2007 | work = OSNews | access-date = March 31, 2011 | ref = I was quickly contacted by Robert Wilhelm, and later by Werner Lemberg who helped me tremendously manage the project. Robert retired from the team a long time ago, but Werner is still very actively maintaining FreeType}}</ref><ref>{{cite web | url = https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/freetype/freetype2.git/plain/docs/FTL.TXT | title = The FreeType Project LICENSE | date = January 27, 2006 | work = FreeType | format = text | access-date = March 31, 2011}}</ref> and FreeType contributors | logo = 360px | released = {{Start date and age|df=yes|1996}}<ref name="history">{{cite web | url = https://freetype.org/history.html | title = FreeType History | date = 2013-07-02 | access-date = 2014-08-06}}</ref> | latest release version = {{wikidata|property|edit|reference|P348}} | latest release date = {{start date and age|{{wikidata|qualifier|P348|P577}}}} | operating system = Cross-platform | programming language = C | genre = Software development library: Font rasterization | license = GNU General Public License / [https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/freetype/freetype2.git/plain/docs/FTL.TXT FreeType License] | website = {{URL|https://freetype.org}} }}
{{Multiple image |width=250 |direction = vertical |image1=Subpixel e.png|alt1=A lower case e |image2=Subpixel is.png|alt2=A lower case is |image3=Subpixel w.png||alt3=A lower case w|caption3=Lower case '''e''', '''is''', and '''w''' subpixel rendered with FreeType}}
'''FreeType''' is a software development library used to render text onto bitmaps, and which provides support for other font-related operations. The FreeType font rasterization engine is free and open-source software with the source code dual-licensed under a BSD-like license and the GPL. FreeType supports a number of font formats, including TrueType, Type 1, and OpenType.<ref name="freetype2">{{cite web |url=https://freetype.sourceforge.net/freetype2/index.html#features |title=FreeType 2 Overview |date=July 4, 2010 |work=FreeType 2 |publisher=SourceForge, Inc. |at=Features |access-date=March 31, 2011 |ref=features}}</ref>
==History== The FreeType rendering engine was started in 1995 by David Turner with the intent to provide TrueType font support for the OS/2 operating system,<ref name="osnews-dt-interview"/> including an interpreter for handling TrueType bytecode. Originally written in the Pascal programming language, it was ported in 1997 by Robert Wilhelm to C.<ref name="history"/><ref name="freetype2.1.9faq">{{cite web |title= The FreeType 2 FAQ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090718090712/http://www.cs.sunysb.edu/documentation/freetype-2.1.9/docs/ft2faq.html |archive-date=18 July 2009 |url=http://www.cs.sunysb.edu/documentation/freetype-2.1.9/docs/ft2faq.html}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.experts123.com/q/what-are-the-differences-between-freetype-1.x-and-freetype-2.html |title=What are the differences between FreeType 1.x and FreeType 2 ? |publisher=Experts123.com |access-date=2014-04-04}}</ref>
FreeType 1 had support only for the TrueType font format, but it included an extension to support OpenType text layout features.
===Major rewrite 2.0=== Version 2.0 of FreeType was a complete rewrite to make it more modular. FreeType 2 brought support for more font formats and an evolved source code which the developers stated was "simpler and more powerful".<ref name="freetype2faq">{{cite web |url=https://www.freetype.org/freetype2/docs/ft2faq.html |title=FreeType 2 FAQ |work=FreeType 2 |access-date=July 26, 2011 |ref=features}}</ref> FreeType 2 is not backward-compatible with FreeType 1 but the developers stated that moving from FreeType 1 to FreeType 2 poses little difficulty.<ref name="freetype2faq"/> As ''text layout processing'' was not an objective of FreeType 2, however, the OpenType text layout functionality of FreeType 1 was removed in FreeType 2. A very evolved form of the OpenType text layout functionality of FreeType 1 is used in the Pango text layout library. The HarfBuzz project is further evolving that functionality with a complete rewrite offered as a standalone library with a less restrictive license than Pango's license.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.freedesktop.org/wiki/Software/HarfBuzz |title=HarfBuzz |publisher=Freedesktop.org |access-date=2014-04-04}}</ref>
===Patent conflicts=== In 1999, the Freetype project was informed by Apple Incorporated that FreeType was infringing patents related to TrueType font hinting. Following that, Freetype deactivated by default or worked around patent relating technologies. Therefore, several open source projects, such as FreeBSD or Linux, had FreeType included with font hinting functionality disabled or degraded to avoid the issue of software patents held by Apple Inc.<ref name="patents">{{cite web |url=https://www.freetype.org/patents.html |title=FreeType and Patents |date=July 4, 2010 |work=FreeType |publisher=SourceForge, Inc. |access-date=March 31, 2011 |ref=features}}</ref>
Since May 2010, all conflicting software patents related to font hinting have expired,<ref name="patents"/> allowing FreeType's TrueType font hinter to be used in open source. Many of the operating systems which disabled the renderer now give the user the option to enable it. In Fedora, freetype-freeworld was switched from the proprietary yum repository to the free repository.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/development/rawhide/source/SRPMS/repoview/freetype-freeworld.html |title=RepoView: RPM Fusion (Fedora - free) development Source RPM Packages |publisher=Download1.rpmfusion.org |date=2014-03-11 |access-date=2014-04-04 |archive-date=2014-04-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140407065422/http://download1.rpmfusion.org/free/fedora/development/rawhide/source/SRPMS/repoview/freetype-freeworld.html |url-status=dead }}</ref>
Since August 2019, all conflicting software patents related to ClearType color filtering have expired,<ref name="patents" /> allowing FreeType to use ClearType color filtering method in 2.10.3.
===Compact Font Format engine donation=== In 2013 Adobe donated a Compact Font Format rendering engine to the FreeType project which integrated it and made it the default with version 2.5.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://blog.typekit.com/2013/05/01/adobe-contributes-cff-rasterizer-to-freetype/| title=Adobe contributes font rasterizer technology to FreeType |website=Adobe TypeKit Blog |date=1 May 2013 |first=Nicole |last=Miñoza}}</ref><ref>{{cite web| url=https://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2013/06/youve-got-cff.html |title=You've Got CFF! |date=19 June 2013 |website=Google Open Source Blog }}</ref>
==Users== FreeType is used as a font renderer in Android, ChromeOS, OpenHarmony, HarmonyOS.<ref name="blogspot1">{{cite web|url=https://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2013/05/got-cff.html |title= Got CFF? |publisher=Google Open Source Blog |date= 1 May 2013 |access-date=2014-04-04}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |title=OpenHarmony/third_party_freetype |url=https://gitee.com/openharmony/third_party_freetype |access-date=2025-03-13 |website=Gitee |language=zh-CN}}</ref> Apple uses FreeType in iOS<ref name="blogspot1"/> and macOS<ref>{{cite web|url=https://support.apple.com/kb/HT5130 |title=About the security content of OS X Lion v10.7.3 and Security Update 2012-001 |publisher=Support.apple.com |date=2012-05-31 |access-date=2014-04-04}}</ref> next to Apple Advanced Typography. In 2007, Sun Microsystems switched from using a proprietary font rasterizer to using FreeType in the OpenJDK Java development kit.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://openjdk.java.net/projects/font-scaler/ |title=Font Scaler |access-date=4 April 2014}}</ref> On Windows, projects like gdipp<ref>{{cite web |url=https://code.google.com/p/gdipp/ |title=gdipp |access-date=4 August 2014}}</ref> and MacType<ref>{{cite web|url=https://github.com/snowie2000/MacType|title=MacType|website=GitHub|access-date=2016-09-12}}</ref> aim to override the system renderer with FreeType. FreeType is also used as a font renderer in ReactOS.<ref name="lowendmacreview">{{cite web|url=http://lowendmac.com/2014/reactos-a-windows-compatible-alternative-os/ |title=ReactOS: A Windows Compatible Alternative OS |publisher=lowendmac.com |first=Simon |last=Royal |date=2014-02-26 |access-date=2016-01-10 |quote=''While the main core of ReactOS is built from scratch, it has some dependencies on existing software and protocols. It uses parts of Wine, networking in the form of lwIP, USB from Haiku, as well as FreeType, Mesa3D, and UniATA.''}}</ref>
As well as being used by the major free software desktop systems, FreeType has been used as a rasterization engine for some modern video games,<ref>Games company Relic Entertainment has used FreeType for their games Dawn of War and Company of Heroes, as can be seen in the credits on the loading screens.</ref><ref>FreeType has also been implemented in the American Girl games for the PC such as ''A Treehouse of My Own'' and ''Julie Saves The Eagles''.</ref><ref>Games company Bandai Namco Entertainment has also used FreeType for Ace Combat 7: Skies Unknown, as can be seen in the copyright section.</ref> and Opera for the Wii.<ref>Opera 9 for the Wii console uses FreeType, as can be seen by looking at the "Third-party information" page which can be found on the Wii via: Internet Channel > Operations Guide > About > Opera 9 for Wii — Third-party information</ref> Sony ships FreeType with its PlayStation 3,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.scei.co.jp/ps3-license/index.html |title=PlayStation 3 License |publisher=Scei.co.jp |access-date=2014-04-04}}</ref> PlayStation 4,<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.scei.co.jp/ps4-license/index.html |title=Open Source Software used in PlayStation®4 |publisher=Scei.co.jp |access-date=2014-04-04}}</ref> and PlayStation Vita<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.scei.co.jp/psvita-license/index.html |title=Open Source Software used in PlayStation®Vita |publisher=Scei.co.jp |access-date=2014-04-04}}</ref> consoles.
{{Portal|Free and open-source software}}
==References== {{Reflist|30em}}
==External links== {{Commons category}} * {{Official website}} * [https://conan.io/center/freetype/2.10.1/ FreeType C++ Package]
{{Free and open-source typography}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Freetype}} Category:Computer-related introductions in 1996 Category:C (programming language) libraries Category:Free typesetting software Category:Text rendering libraries