Font embedding
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Summary
Font embedding refers to technology that saves fonts (or subsets of fonts) inside document files. The aim of this is that recipients of the document can see it as it was designed, without having to have the fonts already installed on their computer. The benefits for publishers are obvious.
Restrictions on embedding
For many years it has concerned type designers and foundries that font embedding entails their data moving, inside documents, to places where it is not licensed. It has not been possible to assure foundries that font data is not extractable from documents containing embedded fonts.
Embedding bits
Around 1991 Microsoft extended the TrueType specification to allow font developers to specify under what conditions their fonts may be embedded inside documents. At that time, before the web and mass use of e-mail, it was probably thought that documents would not often travel widely. Thus the first form of the specification does not offer much control to font developers. For more, see embedding bits.
Server-side rendering
Fonts or font-like systems that are server based and either join up a couple of images or compile a Flash string appear to be still largely neglected in current EULAs. A thing that is coming up now quite frequently and on the self proclaimed "13th most popular website on the planet" Mike Davidson (http://www.mikeindustries.com/blog/archive/2004/09/sifr2-kick-the-tires) is a mechanism that uses Flash files (*.swf) to carry a whole set of glyphs to display fonts on websites with a CSS (http://w3.org/Style/CSS/) workaround, that prevents search engines from finding the content on one hand but style a website quite nicely on the other. An example of the mechanism can be found here (http://www.mikeindustries.com/blog/files/sifr/2.0/) and there (http://www.mikeindustries.com/blog/files/sifr/2.0/tradegothic.swf?txt=Fontlab+Wiki).
Types of embedding
- PDF font embedding
- Microsoft Office font embedding
- Flash font embedding
- Microsoft WEFT
- Bitstream WebFont
- FontLab PhotoFont
Resources:
- Adobe: Font Embedding Guidelines for Adobe Third-party Developers (http://partners.adobe.com/asn/acrobat/sdk/public/docs/FontPolicies.pdf)
- Microsoft: Font embedding for the Web (http://www.microsoft.com/typography/web/embedding/default.htm)
- Microsoft WEFT (http://www.microsoft.com/typography/web/embedding/weft2/default.htm)
- Agfa Monotype: Licenses for Font Embedding, Streaming and Web Servers (http://www.fonts.com/fontservices/services_home.asp?nCo=AFMT&con=embedding)
- WebMonkey: Embedding Fonts Tutorial (http://webmonkey.wired.com/webmonkey/design/fonts/tutorials/tutorial2.html)
- FontLab Photofont website (http://www.photofont.com)
