Software:Skia Graphics Engine

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Short description: Open source graphics library written in C++
Skia Graphics Engine
Skia Project Logo.svg
Original author(s)Skia Inc.
Developer(s)Google
Written inC++
Operating systemAndroid, iOS, Linux, macOS, Windows
TypeGraphics library
LicenseNew BSD License
Websiteskia.org
skia.googlesource.com/skia

The Skia Graphics Engine or Skia is an open-source 2D graphics library written in C++. Skia abstracts away platform-specific graphics API (which differ from one to another).[1] Skia Inc. originally developed the library; Google acquired it in 2005,[2] and then released the software as open source licensed under the New BSD free software license in 2008.

Overview

In order to stay multi-platform, Skia supports several (platform-dependent) back-ends. These include:

  • CPU software rasterization
  • Portable Document Format (PDF) output
  • GPU-accelerated rendering by using:[3]
    • ANGLE backed, which translates OpenGL ES calls into vendor's native APIs
    • Vulkan, and Metal.

Skia is most similar in purpose to Cairo or Pathfinder (meaning that it focuses on drawing) rather than to other more elaborate APIs like that one of Qt that provide their own widgets and UI description language etc.[4]

Application

The library is used (As of 2021 ) in Google Chrome, ChromeOS, ChromiumOS, Mozilla Firefox, Mozilla Thunderbird, Android, Firefox OS, Flutter,[5] Avalonia (from Alpha 4) and LibreOffice (from version 7.0).

Supported platforms

  • Windows 7, 8, 8.1, 10
  • macOS 10.10.5 or later
  • iOS 8 or later
  • Android 4.1 (JellyBean) or later
  • Ubuntu 14.04+, Debian 8+, openSUSE 13.3+, or Fedora Linux 24+
  • Web Browsers[6]

Etymology

Skia is a romanisation of the word 'shadow' in Greek (Σκιά).

History

Skia Inc, developers of the Skia Graphics Engine, was founded in 2004 by Mike Reed and Cary Clark in Chapel Hill North Carolina, before being acquired by Google in 2005.[7]

See also

References

External links

YouTube