GNU FreeFont as Web Font
The GPL and your web site
-------------------------
The GPL license permits the use of GNU FreeFont binary files of release
20100919 or later as Web fonts with the CSS @font-face technology.
Note that releases of the fonts earlier than 20100919 *do not* contain
adequate license information, and *must not* be used as Web fonts.
We will refer to the releases dated 20100919 or later as "licensed releases".
Proper use of licensed releases of GPL FreeFont with this technology does
not in itself incur the requirements of the GPL, either on the Web page
from which the font is referenced, or the Web site that hosts the font file.
From the point of view of the GPL, the @font-face technology is a distribution
system of font files. According to the GPL, the files must be delivered with
intact notifications of the license, and of where to get the original source
files. Furthermore, if the files are modified in any way, a notice must be
delivered of who modified the files on what date, and what modifications
were made.
The licensed release font binary files as packaged on the GNU FreeFont
download page have embedded within them the license and origin notices
required to re-distribute them unmodified.
Software for reading the contents of font files is readily available for
anybody who wishes to look at the embedded notices.
Using the fonts without modifications
-------------------------------------
If you simply distribute the TrueType, OpenType, or WOFF files of licensed
releases as packaged at the GNU FreeFont download site, the requirements of
the GPL are already fulfilled.
Modifying the fonts for use as Web fonts
----------------------------------------
You may wish to modify the fonts for use as web fonts.
For example, perhaps your site needs only a portion of the font's glyphs.
As the fonts are very large, it may improve loading speed very much to
cut out unneeded parts of the font.
If you provide modified versions of the fonts, you must take care to
satisfy the GPL stipulation that two kinds of notices must be provided
with any distribution of FreeFont. These are
1) the original GPL license and notifications of origin
2) a description of modifications made to the font: who, when, what.
This information *must* be present in the font binary files delivered
from the web site.
There is more than one way to satisfy the GPL.
The simplest strategy would be the following:
Leave undisturbed the original "TTF Names" fields of the licensed release
font binaries:
Version
Copyright
Manufacturer
Vendor
Vendor URL
License
License URL
In the font file's "TTF Names" field with ID "Descriptor", append text
indicating
* who performed the modifications, and their contact information
* date of modifications
* outline of what was modified
For example:
Modified Oct. 2011 by Steve White <stevan.white@gmail.com>
Most character ranges besides Latin were removed.
If you do more than simply trim away character ranges from the font,
we at the FreeFont project we would ask you to
* append your own copyright notice to the Copyright field
* change the Version string to your own
* change Vendor and Vendor URL to your own name and URL.
(We don't want to be getting bug reports on your modifications!)
$Id: webfont_guidelines.txt 2221 2012-04-16 22:45:30Z Stevan_White $
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