FreeType 2.11 Released With New Rendering Module, Smooth Rasterizer Is Faster

[phoronix]

Phoronix: FreeType 2.11 Released With New Rendering Module, Smooth Rasterizer Is Faster

FreeType 2.11 is out as the newest version of this widely-used library for font rasterization...

https://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=news_item&px=FreeType-2.11

[doomie]

geeze, 10% not small

[uid313]

But is it beautiful?
Or is things still covered by patents and only available using build flags or out-of-tree patches?

[microcode]

But is it beautiful?
Or is things still covered by patents and only available using build flags or out-of-tree patches?

That hasn't been a thing for years now.

[tildearrow]

But is it beautiful?
Or is things still covered by patents and only available using build flags or out-of-tree patches?

So are you saying FreeType is ugly?
It's not as crisp as Windows font rendering, but honestly I enjoy FreeType better.
At least it's not as bad as macOS font rendering which is blurry...

[onlyLinuxLuvUBack]

phoronix benchmark could probably be 100 font draws old version vs new version rendered on a raylib or sdl2 surface.

[uid313]

So are you saying FreeType is ugly?
It's not as crisp as Windows font rendering, but honestly I enjoy FreeType better.
At least it's not as bad as macOS font rendering which is blurry...

No, I am not saying that. I use Ubuntu and the fonts look good to me, but I don't really know if it uses FreeType or what it uses, and I use pretty normal boring fonts at 1080p resolution.

I don't know how it looks on other distributions or how it looks on a 4K screen. I think I tried out Fedora a few years ago and that font rendering there looked terrible.

Neither do I know how it compares to macOS. But I think my Ubuntu and Windows 10 both look good and don't think either looks better than the other.

[Charlie68]

While until a few years ago the only distribution that had decent fonts by default was Ubuntu, in recent years Fedora, openSUSE etc. they have good fonts (they were terrible before). However fonts are always a personal thing, some love Windows ones, while I have always found them horrible, so I think the improvements can only make everyone happy.

[tildearrow]

No, I am not saying that. I use Ubuntu and the fonts look good to me, but I don't really know if it uses FreeType or what it uses, and I use pretty normal boring fonts at 1080p resolution.

I don't know how it looks on other distributions or how it looks on a 4K screen. I think I tried out Fedora a few years ago and that font rendering there looked terrible.

Neither do I know how it compares to macOS. But I think my Ubuntu and Windows 10 both look good and don't think either looks better than the other.

Here are my settings for it:

- Anti-aliasing: RGB
- Hinting: Slight

Using full or medium hinting makes the font rendering look terrible.

[arQon]

But is it beautiful?
Or is things still covered by patents and only available using build flags or out-of-tree patches?

It's been a long time since I worked with FreeType, but IIRC the only patent hassle remaining even back then was ?ClearType?, i.e. MS's sub-pixel AA. And TBH I preferred to NOT use that anyway, as it only really works for white-on-black (or vice versa) and falls apart if you're using anything more than a few shades away from that.