Prehistory of digital fonts

Abstract

Over the second half of the 20th century, typography moved from physical metal type to the abstractions of digital computing. This revolution did not follow a straight path. We examine here some of the very first attempts to produce printed characters on computers. Inthe 1950s, to satisfy the needs of physicists, the first vectorized letters (and numbers, signs, . . . ) were made on CRT screens and plotters. In the 1960s, the dot matrix concept allowed consideration of characters as surfaces, leading to digital phototypesetting. In the 1970s, thanks to research in computer-aided design, the way was opened to the fundamentals of digital letter outlines. The first font formats occurred in the late 1970s. The innovation of laser printers, around 1985, marked the beginning of the mature rendering of digital fonts, and the beginning of the commercial font wars, where we will leave off.