FreeType

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FreeType

Developed by	FreeType contributors
Latest release	2.3.5 / 2 July 2007^[1]
OS	Cross-platform
Genre	Font rasterization
License	GNU General Public License / FreeType License
Website	http://freetype.org/

FreeType is a software library that implements a font rasterization engine. It is used to rasterize characters into bitmaps and provides support for other font-related operations.

FreeType does not provide APIs to perform higher-level features, like text layout or graphics processing (e.g., colored text rendering, "hollowing", etc.). However, it greatly simplifies these tasks by providing a simple, easy to use and uniform interface to access the content of font files.

As of July 2007, the latest version of FreeType is FreeType 2.3.5, which works with an assortment of font formats, including TrueType, Type 1, and OpenType.

FreeType is released under two free software licenses: the GNU General Public License or a license similar to the original BSD license (with the advertising clause). The library can thus be used by any kind of project, be it proprietary or not. This has led to FreeType being widely adopted as a rasterization engine for modern video games which require high-quality text.^[2]