Editing TrueType (section)

==Outlines==
[[File:Circle and quadratic bezier.svg|thumb|right|A quadratic Bézier curve segment is defined by two end points and one control point.  This circle is eight contiguous segments.  The squares are end points and the circles are control points.]]
The outlines of the characters (or [[glyph]]s) in TrueType fonts are made of straight line segments and quadratic [[Bézier curve]]s. These curves are mathematically simpler and faster to process than cubic Bézier curves, which are used both in the [[PostScript]]-centered world of [[graphic design]] and in Type 1 fonts. However, most shapes require more points to describe with quadratic curves than cubics. This difference also means that it is not possible to convert Type 1 losslessly to the TrueType format, although in practice it is often possible to do a lossless conversion from TrueType to Type 1.<ref>
{{cite web| url = http://www.tug.org/TUGboat/Articles/tb21-2/tb67advo.pdf| title = "Interview: Donald E. Knuth" by advogato}}</ref><ref>{{cite web| url = http://www.advogato.org/article/28.html| title = "Interview: Donald E. Knuth" by advogato}}
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