The Font Wars were a decades-long competition in the computer industry for dominance in font technology, viewed as a key success factor for personal computing platforms. The Font Wars spurred innovative scientific research into the small, nearly subliminal forms of the printed letters on which modern civilization was based, yet which had received little scrutiny outside the printing trades. More than a business episode, the Font Wars were above all a manifestation and translation of ideas—some modern, some ancient, some theoretical, some practical—into computer software and hardware. At the heart of the Font Wars was a fundamental question: What is the best way to turn traditional printed letter forms into digital fonts for computer screens and printers? Answers to this question were researched, implemented, and launched into the marketplace, where their intense competition transformed the 500 year tradition of printing and publishing, placing the electronic literacy on the screens of billions of digital displays, computers, tablets, and smart phones around the world.

中文翻译：

---

字体大战，第 1 部分

字体大战是计算机行业长达数十年的争夺字体技术主导地位的竞争，被视为个人计算平台成功的关键因素。字体大战激发了对现代文明所基于的印刷字母的小而近乎潜意识的形式的创新科学研究，但在印刷行业之外很少受到审查。字体大战不仅仅是一个商业事件，它首先是思想——一些现代的，一些古老的，一些理论的，一些实用的——到计算机软件和硬件的体现和转化。字体大战的核心是一个基本问题：将传统印刷字母形式转变为计算机屏幕和打印机的数字字体的最佳方法是什么？这个问题的答案已被研究、实施并投放市场，