Re: Font license recommendation

[Walter Landry <wlandry@ucsd.edu>]

Lars Hellström  <Lars.Hellstrom@math.umu.se> wrote:
> At 01.14 +0200 2002-07-29, Thomas Bushnell, BSG wrote:
> >It would be better to give an explicit permission to use the font
> >freely in documents. The case is so special that it is not advisable
> >to rely on analogies with software.
> 
> You mean I could say something like
> 
>   This font is free software; you can redistribute it and/or
>   modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public
>   License ...
>   Furthermore the font can be included in documents without
>   any additional restriction.
> 
> ? I suspect the wording in that "furthermore" clause could be tricky
> however. Verbatim copying is too restrictive, since fonts are commonly
> subsetted as part of the inclusion process.

It is probably better to use something like what libgcj uses

    As a special exception, if you use these fonts to produce a
    document, these fonts do not by themselves cause the resulting
    document to be covered by the GNU General Public License.  This
    exception does not however invalidate any other reasons why the
    document might be covered by the GNU General Public License.

That way, people simply creating documents wouldn't have to worry
(much like people who use gcj don't have to worry).  However, someone
modifying the fonts and distributing it will have to make "source"
available.

Regards,
Walter Landry
wlandry@ucsd.edu