: How do I properly create a derivative work with a font licensed as SIL Open Font? Got a font that I want to do a custom subset for on the Web - picking contextual alternates and discarding

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Got a font that I want to do a custom subset for on the Web - picking contextual alternates and discarding unneeded characters to help keep the file size down. FontSquirrel has a great generator, but a lot of the fonts come with this notification:

The license for this font is the SIL OFL license. This license does not allow us to redistribute derivative versions of the font without wholesale name changes inside and out of the font. Until we figure out a reasonable method of delivering these to you and complying with the license, you will have to use the Webfont Generator yourself on these, renaming the fonts appropriately.

What constitutes as 'wholesale name changes inside and out of the font'? I want to comply with what seems to be an excellent license correctly.

Suppose it's also worth asking what constitutes a derivative work as well. The font I'm interested in is available on Google Fonts, and it seems like a custom subset was made to distribute on their CDN. Is subsetting not something that triggers this stuff at all?

I've been trying to wrap my head around the SIL site but am not doing a very good job.

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: Questions about making file sizes as small as possible, balancing with quality. Optimization ensures fast loading of the file, important for web use, especially mobile.

@Chiappetta793

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: Nice question. It seems to be some non-latin fonts designed to resemble latin-ish, but in my opinion is very difficult judge whether they resemble latin for all the world cultures or not.

@Chiappetta793

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: .cur is a file format for MicroSoft Windows. It is very similar to .ico, and it's only used for non-animated cursors. source: Wikipedia: .ico

@Chiappetta793

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: Questions about the production process of printed materials.

@Chiappetta793

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@Steve758

There's 2 official answers from the SIL site (that maintains and documents the SIL/OFL licence):

Is subsetting a web font considered modification?

Web Fonts and Reserved Font Names

The summary (at least as I unserstand it) is: you are allowed to convert into WOFF format while keeping the reserved font name, as long as you dont subset. Other formats or subsetting are not allowed without changing the name.

They suggest contacting the author to encourage her to release the font without Reserved font name or get a special licence permission to get around this limitation.

Personally, i think it is ridiculous to expect people to rename open source fonts because they subset or convert to another format. I suspect most type designers did not have this in mind when they chose this licence,

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: How do I properly create a derivative work with a font licensed as SIL Open Font? Got a font that I want to do a custom subset for on the Web - picking contextual alternates and discarding

More posts by @Chiappetta793

: Questions about making file sizes as small as possible, balancing with quality. Optimization ensures fast loading of the file, important for web use, especially mobile.

: Nice question. It seems to be some non-latin fonts designed to resemble latin-ish, but in my opinion is very difficult judge whether they resemble latin for all the world cultures or not.

: .cur is a file format for MicroSoft Windows. It is very similar to .ico, and it's only used for non-animated cursors. source: Wikipedia: .ico

: Questions about the production process of printed materials.

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