Re: Bug#423683: msttcorefonts: Windows Vista Fonts available legally for free
- To: debian-legal@lists.debian.org
- Subject: Re: Bug#423683: msttcorefonts: Windows Vista Fonts available legally for free
- From: Adam Borowski <kilobyte@angband.pl>
- Date: Mon, 14 May 2007 22:23:55 +0200
- Message-id: <20070514202355.GA14998@angband.pl>
- In-reply-to: <1179156244.16466.3.camel@beppo>
- References: <1179091426.19715.7.camel@beppo> <200705141325.21324.thijs@debian.org> <1179156244.16466.3.camel@beppo>
On Mon, May 14, 2007 at 05:24:04PM +0200, Fabian Greffrath wrote:
> Am Montag, den 14.05.2007, 13:25 +0200 schrieb Thijs Kinkhorst:
> > I've reviewed the licence, and I'm afraid it's a bit more bothered than that
> > of the ms core fonts for the web: "You may use the software only to view and
> > print files created with Microsoft Office software. You may not use the
> > software for any other purpose.". If I would include this into the
> > msttcorefonts package this would severely limit the possibilities with these
> > core fonts, that are currently free to be used for whatever purpose.
There's a similar thing, except without the usage restrictions: their
"Consolas" font. And while the other Vista fonts are only so-so even
compared to ttf-dejavu, I have to admit that Consolas is an awesome terminal
font. A whole deal better than DejaVu Mono Sans. And in an ironic turn,
while on M$ it _needs_ ClearType (and thus LCD) to be usable, with FreeType
it's very good even on CRT.
There is a string attached, though -- but one of a different kind. You need
to be a "licensed user of Microsoft Visual Studio 2005". It does have a
gratis edition, but that's a 35MB download just to satisfy the license.
> Well, I see this point. How about a separate package, maybe
> 'ttf-vistafonts' or 'msvistacorefonts' which is in no way connected to
> the 'msttcorefonts' package and shows a debconf warning about the
> restrictions these fonts are subject to?
Yeah, viewing MS Office files is a tiny portion of what we do, so the
usability of that package would be really limited. On the other hand,
coding using a monospaced font...
--
1KB // Microsoft corollary to Hanlon's razor:
// Never attribute to stupidity what can be
// adequately explained by malice.
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