Bitstream Releases Font Fusion 2.2, the Fastest Font Engine On the Market.Business/Technology Editors CAMBRIDGE, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jan. 29, 2002 Bitstream is Also Releasing the Wireless Font Set, Designed Specifically for Handheld and Wireless Devices Bitstream Inc. (NASDAQ NASDAQ in full National Association of Securities Dealers Automated Quotations U.S. market for over-the-counter securities. Established in 1971 by the National Association of Securities Dealers (NASD), NASDAQ is an automated quotation system that reports on : BITS) announced today the release of Font Fusion Bitstream Font Fusion is a small, fast, object-oriented font engine written in ANSI C capable of rendering high-quality text on any platform, any device, and at any resolution. The entire source code is portable, optimized, and executes independent of operating system and processor. (TM) 2.2, the company's smallest, most advanced font rasterizing rasterizing - rasterising engine and the fastest font engine on the market today. Simultaneously, Bitstream is releasing the Wireless Font Set(TM), which is made up of high-quality fonts that render well at small point sizes on any display. The fonts are designed specifically for handheld and wireless devices and produce high-quality output for color LCD, grayscale In computing, a grayscale or greyscale digital image is an image in which the value of each pixel is a single sample. Displayed images of this sort are typically composed of shades of gray, varying from black at the weakest intensity to white at the strongest, though in , and black-and-white displays. Bitstream assembled the Wireless Font Set using the Kaasila(TM) font family A set of fonts of the same typeface in assorted sizes, including bold, italic and bold italic variations. . This family of fonts is designed specifically for wireless devices, and is named in honor of Font Fusion's chief software architect, Sampo Kaasila. The Wireless Font Set allows Font Fusion to render characters for a specific device, making the text easy to read. These fonts have been fine-tuned and are specifically designed to fit as much text as possible onto a small screen, as well as provide maximum legibility at small sizes. The fonts are all new designs and are delta-hinted. Delta hinting is the process of fine-tuning fonts so that they are easy to read at small sizes. Hinting has been optimized to produce the best quality output for color LCD displays. These fonts also display high-quality output on grayscale screens and black-and-white displays. The Wireless Font Set includes four proportional fonts, four monospaced fonts, and one symbol font: -- Kaasila BT Roman -- Kaasila BT Oblique -- Kaasila BT Bold -- Kaasila BT Bold Oblique -- Kaasila Monospace BT Roman -- Kaasila Monospace BT Oblique -- Kaasila Monospace BT Bold -- Kaasila Monospace BT Bold Oblique -- Kaasila Symbol BT "We are very pleased to announce the completion of Font Fusion 2.2 and the Wireless Font Set. As devices get smaller, the ability to read characters on the screen becomes critical. Companies developing the hottest wireless and handheld gadgets now have a solution that will give them great looking text on their displays," said Anna Chagnon, President of Bitstream. "With this release of Font Fusion, we have solidified our position as the leading font rendering technology for wireless devices, handheld devices, and other embedded systems Embedded systems Computer systems that cannot be programmed by the user because they are preprogrammed for a specific task and are buried within the equipment they serve. . Font Fusion produces high-quality output and supports 8 different font rasterizers. And we have the fastest font engine on the market, including the fastest TrueType rasterizer available." What Our Partners Have to Say "We've been continually impressed with Bitstream's ability to lead the industry in font technology and in their responsive attitude toward customers and partners," said Simon Woodward, CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. and President of ANT Limited. "We chose Bitstream's Font Fusion because it was by far the fastest font rasterizing engine we evaluated, producing the highest quality output." "Font Fusion complements the QNX A multiuser, multitasking, real time operating system for PCs from QNX Software Systems, Ltd., Ottawa, Ontario (www.qnx.com), that is noted for its low-memory requirement and rapid response. Similar to Unix, it has been in use since the early 1980s. Photon microGUI with its speed, ease-of-use, and high performance under memory constraints," said Linda Campbell, vice president of strategic alliances at QNX Software Systems. "With Font Fusion, QNX customers building Internet appliances, in-car telematics systems, and other embedded devices can deliver fast, highly readable displays, and, ultimately, a better user experience." "Bitstream is the recognized leader in font technology," said Leo Leo, in astronomy Leo [Lat.,=the lion], northern constellation lying S of Ursa Major and on the ecliptic (apparent path of the sun through the heavens) between Cancer and Virgo; it is one of the constellations of the zodiac. Jolicoeur, Vice President, Product Marketing, for WebEx. "Incorporating Bitstream's Font Fusion into our interactive communications platform will enable WebEx to offer our customers and partners fast, accurate text rendering during their WebEx meetings." About Font Fusion Font Fusion provides developers with full font fidelity and high-quality typographic output at any resolution on any device, while maintaining the integrity of the original character shapes. Available as an SDK (Software Developer's Kit) See developer's toolkit and Windows SDK. SDK - Software Developers Kit (or "Software Development Kit"). (Software Developers' Kit), Font Fusion is able to rasterize To prepare a page for display or printing. Rasterization is performed by a raster image processor (RIP), which turns text and images into the matrix of pixels (bitmap) that will be displayed on screen or printed on the page. Various conversions may take place. 8 different font formats: TrueType(R), Type 1, CFF/Type2, T2K T2K Tempest 2000 (game; sequel to Tempest) T2K Time 2 Kill (gaming clan) (R) Latin, T2K Asian, TrueDoc(R) PFR (portable font resource A Portable Font Resource (PFR) is an outline font standard developed by Bitstream that compactly encodes font for use in web pages through their TrueDoc system. TrueDoc was natively supported in Netscape Navigator 4, but was discontinued in Netscape Navigator 6 and Mozilla ), Bitstream Speedo An earlier scalable font technology from Bitstream Inc., Cambridge, MA (www.bitstream.com). Speedo fonts used the .SPD extension. See FaceLift. (R), and Font Fusion stroke (FFS (Flash File System) Software from Microsoft that made flash memory look like a disk drive. It was superseded by the Flash Translation Layer (FTL) from PCMCIA and M-Systems. See flash memory. ) format, as well as embedded bitmaps. Developers can also license a number of different suites of fonts, including delta-hinted screen fonts and the TV Font Pack. Font Fusion is small and fast. Most developers can compile the source code in 32-105 KB, depending on options. It generates more than 16,000 characters per second, using the Arial(R) font at 25 lines per em on a 233MHz (MegaHertZ) One million cycles per second. It is used to measure the transmission speed of electronic devices, including channels, buses and the computer's internal clock. A one-megahertz clock (1 MHz) means some number of bits (16, 32, 64, etc. Pentium(R) II processor, cache turned off. Font Fusion performs well in memory- and performance-constrained environments. For example, a complete traditional Chinese TrueType font with over 13,000 characters can occupy as much as 8 MB. With Font Fusion, the same characters occupy less than 0.5 MB, representing considerable savings in memory and disk space costs. Font Fusion is designed for operating systems, software applications, Web applications, low-resolution screen devices, multimedia servers, high-definition television screens (HDTVs), set-top boxes, continuous tone printers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and other embedded systems and information and wireless appliances. About Bitstream Bitstream Inc. (Nasdaq:BITS) is the leading developer of font technology, digital fonts, and custom font designs. Bitstream licenses its award-winning TrueDoc(R) and Font Fusion(TM) technologies to Web and application developers, and to manufacturers of information appliances, wireless and handheld devices, set-top boxes, embedded systems, and printers. Setting the standard for excellence in font technology, Bitstream holds numerous key patents that cover the creation of portable fonts for the Internet. Building on this experience, Bitstream is currently developing ThunderHawk(TM), a breakthrough technology for the wireless Web. Founded in 1981, Bitstream is the first digital font foundry. In 1999, Bitstream created MyFonts.com, Inc. (http://www.myfonts.com), the Web site for finding, trying, and buying fonts on line. Bitstream is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Find out more about Bitstream at http://www.bitstream.com. Bitstream, Speedo, and TrueDoc are registered trademarks, and Font Fusion, Kaasila, ThunderHawk, and Wireless Font Set are trademarks of Bitstream Inc. T2K is a registered trademark of Type Solutions, Inc., a Bitstream company. Other technologies and brand names are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies. |
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