The GPL font exception clause (or GPL+FE, for short) is an optional clause that can be added to the

GNU General Public License The GNU General Public Licenses (GNU GPL or simply GPL) are a series of widely used free software licenses, or ''copyleft'' licenses, that guarantee end users the freedom to run, study, share, or modify the software. The GPL was the first ...

(GNU GPL) permitting digital fonts shared with that license to be embedded within a

digital document An electronic document is a document that can be sent in non-physical means, such as telex, email, and the internet. Originally, any computer data were considered as something internal—the final data output was always on paper. However, the ...

file without requiring the document itself to also be shared with GPL. Without the clause, conflicts may arise with open-source projects distributing digital fonts which may be used in

desktop publishing Desktop publishing (DTP) is the creation of documents using dedicated software on a personal ("desktop") computer. It was first used almost exclusively for print publications, but now it also assists in the creation of various forms of online co ...

. As explained by Dave Crossland in '' Libre Graphics Magazine'': "A

copyleft Copyleft is the legal technique of granting certain freedoms over copies of copyrighted works with the requirement that the same rights be preserved in derivative works. In this sense, ''freedoms'' refers to the use of the work for any purpose, ...

font may overreach into the documents that use it, unless an exception is made to the normal terms; an additional permission to allow people to combine parts of a font with a document without affecting the license of texts, photographs, illustrations and designs. Most libre fonts today have such a copyleft license – the SIL OFL or GNU GPL with the Font Exception described in the GPL FAQ."

Origin

The font exception was authored in April 2005 by David "Novalis" Turner, a

Free Software Foundation The Free Software Foundation (FSF) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization founded by Richard Stallman on October 4, 1985. The organisation supports the free software movement, with the organization's preference for software being distributed ...

GPL compliance engineer. As he explains, "The situation we were considering was one where a font was embedded in a document (rather than merely referenced). Embedding allows a document to be viewed as the author intended it even on machines that don't have that font installed. So, the document (a copyrighted work) would be derived from the font program (another work). The text of the document, of course, would be unrestricted when distributed without the font." To be in compliance with the GPL,

Red Hat Red Hat, Inc. (formerly Red Hat Software, Inc.) is an American software company that provides open source software products to enterprises and is a subsidiary of IBM. Founded in 1993, Red Hat has its corporate headquarters in Raleigh, North ...

Fedora Linux Fedora Linux is a Linux distribution developed by the Fedora Project. It was originally developed in 2003 as a continuation of the Red Hat Linux project. It contains software distributed under various free and open-source licenses and aims to b ...

project included the font exception with the license for its Liberation font package, albeit with additional restrictions in 2007. These restrictions prompted further discussion among the Debian GNU/Linux distribution's community members concerning the GPL+FE. This attention prompted

Ubuntu Ubuntu ( ) is a Linux distribution based on Debian and composed primarily of free and open-source software. Developed by the British company Canonical (company), Canonical and a community of contributors under a Meritocracy, meritocratic gover ...

to follow suit and create the Ubuntu Font License because they were not satisfied with either the SIL OFL or with GPL+FE.

Usage

To indicate a font exception to the GPL, a digital font creator adds the following language to the end of the GPL text distributed with their font:

As a special exception, if you create a document which uses this font, and embed this font or unaltered portions of this font into the document, this font does not by itself cause the resulting document to be covered by the GNU General Public License. This exception does not however invalidate any other reasons why the document might be covered by the GNU General Public License. If you modify this font, you may extend this exception to your version of the font, but you are not obligated to do so. If you do not wish to do so, delete this exception statement from your version.

References

Free content licenses Free and open-source software licenses GNU Project Copyleft {{Free and open-source typography

Origin

Usage

See also

References