Charis SIL is a glyphic serif typeface

Typeface

In typography, a typeface is the artistic representation or interpretation of characters; it is the way the type looks. Each type is designed and there are thousands of different typefaces in existence, with new ones being developed constantly....

 developed by SIL International

SIL International

SIL International is a U.S.-based, worldwide, Christian non-profit organization, whose main purpose is to study, develop and document languages, especially those that are lesser-known, in order to expand linguistic knowledge, promote literacy, translate the Christian Bible into local languages,...

. It is based on Bitstream Charter

Bitstream Charter

Bitstream Charter is a glyphic serif typeface designed by Matthew Carter in 1987 for Bitstream Inc., a digital type foundry. Bitstream Charter is a typeface optimized for printing on the low-resolution 300 dpi laser printers of the 1980s...

, one of the first fonts designed for laser printers. The font offers four family members: roman, bold, italic, and bold italic (unlike the similar Doulos SIL

Doulos SIL

Doulos SIL is a serif typeface developed by SIL International, very similar to Times or Times New Roman. Unlike Times New Roman, Doulos only has a single face, Regular...

, which comes in roman only).

Its goal is to "provide a single Unicode

Unicode

Unicode is a computing industry standard for the consistent encoding, representation and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems...

-based font family that would contain a comprehensive inventory of glyphs needed for almost any Roman- or Cyrillic-based writing system, whether used for phonetic or orthographic needs."

Charis SIL supports Graphite

Graphite (SIL)

Graphite is a programmable Unicode-compliant smart-font technology and rendering system developed by SIL International. It is free software, distributed under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License and the Common Public License....

, OpenType

OpenType

OpenType is a format for scalable computer fonts. It was built on its predecessor TrueType, retaining TrueType's basic structure and adding many intricate data structures for prescribing typographic behavior...

, and AAT

Apple Advanced Typography

Apple Advanced Typography is Apple Inc's computer software for advanced font rendering, supporting internationalization and complex features for typographers, a successor to Apple's little-used QuickDraw GX font technology of the mid-1990s...

 technologies for advanced rendering features. Along with Doulos SIL, it is licensed under the SIL

SIL International

SIL International is a U.S.-based, worldwide, Christian non-profit organization, whose main purpose is to study, develop and document languages, especially those that are lesser-known, in order to expand linguistic knowledge, promote literacy, translate the Christian Bible into local languages,...

 Open Font License

SIL Open Font License

The SIL Open Font License is a free and open source license designed for fonts by SIL International for use with some of their Unicode fonts. The license is considered free by the Free Software Foundation, which states that a simple hello world program is enough to satisfy the license's requirement...

 [OFL], and can be downloaded free of charge.

As a Sans Serif counterpart the Luxi Sans font has been suggested.

External links

• Smart Unicode typefaces released under free license, Linux.com article on Charis SIL and its release as open source.
• Using IPA fonts with Mac OS X: The Comprehensive Guide, a guide to setting up and using Charis SIL and the International Phonetic Alphabet characters on Mac OS X