Re: [libreoffice-design] Adding Mittaphap / Droid Sans / Khmer OS Fonts to LibreOffice for Lao, Thai, and Khmer Support

On 11/28/2013 04:39 AM, Mirek M. wrote:
> Hi Robert,
> We discussed fonts not too long ago [1].
> We decided against Droid Sans, as it doesn't offer an Italic variant.
> I don't think we could offer Khmer, as the MPL, which LibreOffice is
> licensed under, is more permissive than the LGPL. I'm not sure, though.
> As for Mittaphap, I haven't heard of it. Could you describe it a bit
> more, similar to the way fonts are described at
> https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Design/Wishlists/Fonts? Is it a
> good font typographically?
>
> I'm thinking we should bundle Noto Sans [2] and Noto Serif [3],
> though, as those have the goal of covering all of Unicode.
>
> Thoughts?
>
> [1] https://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Design/Wishlists/Fonts
> [2] https://www.google.com/fonts/specimen/Noto+Sans
> [3] https://www.google.com/fonts/specimen/Noto+Serif

Thanks for the info on this!

As for Droid Sans, makes sense. Italics is pretty important.

As for Khmer, there may be another option around (good open fonts in SE
Asia are hard to find at times). I think SIL has a Khmer font. Or, maybe
Noto has coverage? Also, what licenses do work for LibreOffice?

Mittaphap is a derivative of the Dhyana Lao font on Google's WebFont
Early Access. It's built with graphite in mind, and is being developed
by Jim Brase of SIL. Its OFL licensed (though the font doesn't make this
very clear currently). I have helped connect Jim Brase with others to do
field testing. It's one of a few Lao OFL fonts out there, and it seems
like it's quality. I am not Lao, so I am not authoritative, but all of
the Lao people I have talked to, including those who have used the
Dhyana / Mittaphap fonts I've included on laosabbathschool.com seem to
think it's good.

Phetsarath OT is another Lao font and it is designed by the Lao
government (it's the font that they are pushing to be the standard for
Laos). The licensing, however, is not as clear (at least to me), and I
don't think it has graphite support. It's OFL, I think?  It may work
just as well or better. I know the contacts for that project if that is
the prefered route. Pethsarath OT has a decent adoption (and it's the
Lao governemnt's standard). I just don't think it supports graphite.

I want to make it clear - I really don't care about what font is used.
It needs to be good and needs to be small if the team decides to go that
route, no need for bloat or for junk. And maybe the Design team prefers
not including any laguage fonts for Thai, Khmer, and Lao, and I am ok
with that too, if that is deemed best.

Also, if need be, I can try to design the Lao font myself (something
I've been threatening myself with for a while). I have books on
typography, and some expereince with FontForge. I could even work on
including the glyphs into Noto fonts if that is best (though I would be
curious if they use graphite, or similar). I just figure if there is
already a font out there that can be used, there's no need to reinvent
the wheel. Lao is hard to get 'right' as there are various issues that
have to be taken into account.

I hope my focused approach and proactiveness doesn't seem pushy. Both
LibreOffice and Lao are important to me - I work with them every day on
a tehnical level. I know once LibreOffice 4.2 releases, it could
potentially obtain a large Lao adoption (since Lao word breaks work
natively now). Providing fonts for Thai and Khmer may help people of
those languages (which are similar to Lao) adopt LibreOffice as well.
This could cut down on piracy and also improve technology access for
these people, which is why I've been looking into it for LibreOffice.

I'm very new to the community, so plese forgive me for my newbieness. I
hope to be able to provide more help to develop LibreOffice as
opprotunity provides...

-Robert


-- 
To unsubscribe e-mail to: design+unsubscribe@global.libreoffice.org
Problems? http://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/how-to-unsubscribe/
Posting guidelines + more: http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/Netiquette
List archive: http://listarchives.libreoffice.org/global/design/
All messages sent to this list will be publicly archived and cannot be deleted