[OpenType] MS Proposal for a new Name Table ID

[Ken Lunde]

All,

Regardless of where this information goes, it is important and useful, because implementations are currently forced to employ heuristics to arrive at this information, such as 'OS/2' table settings, Unicode ranges in the 'cmap' table, the language settings for existing 'name' table strings, and so on. Explicitly stating the intended language (or languages) of the font resource, or even the converse, is extraordinarily helpful.

BTW, there already is a 'META' table that Adobe defined for use with SING glyphlets, which are small 'sfnt' resources that include glyph data, but lack a 'name' table so that they cannot present themselves to OSes, applications, and text engines as selectable font resources. Details are here:

  http://partners.adobe.com/public/developer/opentype/gdk/topic.html

-- Ken

On Jan 4, 2013, at 4:45 AM, "Jelle Bosma " <jelleb at euronet.nl> wrote:

> Message from OpenType list:
> 
> 
> Hi,
> 
> I am also a person who doesn't see why this type of information  
> should be added to the name table. As has been pointed out, it is a  
> place to store text to inform the user about the font, not a place to  
> add information to help software to decide to pick a font if the font  
> that is used to create a document isn't present (assuming that  
> persons that create a document have no trouble deciding to pick a  
> font that they can read). It is especially odd to have to store this  
> information marked with platform, encoding and language ID's, as  
> there is no link to the cmap that the font may have, and no any need  
> to localise these tags. This addition makes the name table even more  
> baroque than it already is.
> 
> 
> Best regards,
>   Jelle Bosma
> 
> 
> Op 4-jan-2013, om 6:40 heeft Werner LEMBERG het volgende geschreven:
> 
>> Message from OpenType list:
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>> If we really want to have a means of storing metadata which is
>>> better than the 'OS/2' table, I think it would be a good idea to
>>> create a 'META' table.  Just off the top of my head, I'd suggest
>>> something like:
>> 
>> I support this.
>> 
>> 
>>    Werner
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> List archive: http://www.indx.co.uk/biglistarchive/
>> 
>> subscribe: opentype-migration-sub at indx.co.uk
>> unsubscribe: opentype-migration-unsub at indx.co.uk
>> messages: opentype-migration-list at indx.co.uk
>> 
>> 
> 
>    Monotype Imaging Ltd.
>    De Hovenlaan 205
>    7325 VV Apeldoorn, Nederland
>    Phone +31 (0)55 360 5280
>    Mobile/SMS +31 (0)643509270
>    Email jelleb at euronet.nl
>    www.monotypefonts.com
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> List archive: http://www.indx.co.uk/biglistarchive/
> 
> subscribe: opentype-migration-sub at indx.co.uk
> unsubscribe: opentype-migration-unsub at indx.co.uk
> messages: opentype-migration-list at indx.co.uk
> 
>