How do font files carry licence information (OpenType name IDs 13/14, OFL text and Reserved Font Names), and what do OFL documents say about conversion, WOFF and subsetting?

OpenType name IDs 13 (License Description) and 14 (License Info URL) are free-text licence fields (page dated 2024-05-31). OFL-FAQ 1.1-update7 treats WOFF/WOFF2 conversion as unmodified only if the font data is unchanged apart from compression and metadata is omitted or carried unaltered, and treats webfont subsetting as modification. Curator qualifications: Curator addition: the same FAQ (2.7-2.8, and the IFT entry) allows a modified webfont to keep Reserved Font Names when the optimisation preserves Functional Equivalence; 'subsetting is modification' alone overstates the practical consequence for RFNs. OFL 1.1 licence text (S22) not refetched. Tool behaviour for name IDs 13/14 under conversion remains undocumented (producer gap). Static reading of documents and source; no font parsed and no tool run. Curator amendment CA-AM-0020 (2026-10-22): Narrowing of the curator addition, following lead response C3-B023-FB4 FB4-0005 and the curator's own readback 85226ad6: OFL-FAQ 2.6 says webfont subsetting 'is considered modification. This is permitted by the OFL but would not normally allow the use of RFNs'. The Functional Equivalence route (2.7-2.9) covers only optimisations that keep FE (e.g. technologies that keep the full character inventory available, such as IFT). Ordinary glyph-removal subsetting normally loses RFNs. The phrase 'subsetting is modification alone overstates the practical consequence for RFNs' was too broad: the producer's statement is right for ordinary subsetting, and the FE exception is a narrow qualification. Limitations: Static reading of documents and source; no font parsed and no tool run. FAQ is guidance, not the licence. Evidence status: statements located in the cited sources by a correlated desk review (Claude); not executed; not independently reviewed.

{
  "citations": [
    {
      "url": "https://openfontlicense.org/open-font-license-official-text/",
      "note": "learn.microsoft.com OpenType name table page (curator readback); openfontlicense.org/ofl-faq/ (curator readback), entries 2.2.1, 2.6, 2.7, 2.8"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://openfontlicense.org/ofl-faq/",
      "note": "learn.microsoft.com OpenType name table page (curator readback); openfontlicense.org/ofl-faq/ (curator readback), entries 2.2.1, 2.6, 2.7, 2.8"
    },
    {
      "url": "https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/typography/opentype/spec/name",
      "note": "learn.microsoft.com OpenType name table page (curator readback); openfontlicense.org/ofl-faq/ (curator readback), entries 2.2.1, 2.6, 2.7, 2.8"
    }
  ]
}