I’m confused by the license. While the license is addressed to all downloaders, item 10 implies that Aller is licensed to DSMJ only for use by the school. I don’t see anything in the license stating that the DSMJ can make the font available to the general public or that, as an entity other than DSMJ, I have any license to use the fonts.

Sorry for the confusion. I talked to Bruno Maag and agreed just to let their EULA follow the fonts. But you can download and use them for any purpose you want to – but of course not rename them and re-release them.
Henrik

Well, the fonts are great. Free Bruno Maag type is going to become popular pretty quickly!

Henrik if you agreed to let their EULA follow the fonts, then doesn't that mean that the points of the agreement follow as well? I would ask them to update that EULA to show that anyone can use these fonts, but which I personally don't understand why it would be in their interest to do so.

OK, there seems to be some confusion regarding the EULA. This is a special arrangement. All IP rights are with Dalton Maag on this font family. The DSMJ has the right to distribute the fonts freely as part of their 'exclusivity' for the next two years.

The EULA also states that the fonts may be used on up to 25 workstations after which they become commercial. So, a corporate user will actually have to pay a license fee.

The EULA is there to ensure that users don't distribute the fonts themselves, as much as there are no modifications or reverse engineering. It is a protected font product like any other commercial font.

So, I can put your minds at rest. The DSMJ is fully within their rights to announce this free download. As a user you may use the fonts in your work as you wish, as long as you follow the EULA.

Bruno Maag
Dalton Maag Ltd

Henrik/Bruno, thanks! The type looks great.

Bruno, your strategy could backfire.
If foundries can't make money off sales to less than 25 workstations because the market is full of free fonts like Aller, they may adopt a similar tactic and compete in "your" niche.

I like the alternates for the A in the display. This is really nice! Thank you.

I would like to say here, that it is not our usual policy to publish free fonts. In fact we don't give away any of our fonts.

The case of the Aller font family is different in that the client has paid for the development and negotiated the right to widespread distribution for the next two years. It's not that different to fonts being distributed with Windows. As we retain all the rights to the fonts we have full control over future developments and in two years time we have the opportunity to further exploit the fonts.

Bruno Maag
Dalton Maag

It’s not that different to fonts being distributed with Windows.

If a foundry makes free fonts available for one platform, that can lead to corporate sales for the other, and I've heard the theory that this accounts for a lot of the sales of the old sans faces such as Helvetica. Not sure how well that model would continue to work in the OpenType era.

My philosophy of font marketing (and digital ethics) changed considerably when I read Chris Anderson's essay on "Free" in Wired, although I haven't got around to incorporating my new attitude into any marketing plans yet.

As a .gov-er by day, I always appreciate a quality free font. Thanks!

>The EULA also states that the fonts may be used on up to 25 workstations

Perhaps the company could download the fonts twice or three times giving them 50 or 75 workstations? Or suggest that their users to downlaod the fonts directly?

The fonts are beautiful!

But of course nothing ever turns out right for me. Why would it? Anyway...

I get this error. Also the light weight is not linked with regular and bold.

Mikey :-)

Ok, two answers:
A download does not count as a license. The license talks of installation of 25 workstations. That means if you have the fonts installed on 75 workstations you are in defiance of the EULA, whether you downloaded the fonts once or a 100 times.

This is the typical Fontbook bug. It's been around for blimmin' ages and Apple (the lifestyle company) have done nothing to remedy it. This error occurs when TTF fonts are loaded with a missing 'fpgm' table. This table is necessary for hinted fonts but in unhinted fonts it has no effect whatsoever. You can safely ignore this warning. We ought to issue an update I guess.

You can only link for font styles together. The fonts are engineered so that the Bold can be accessed via the 'B' button in Office apps. That necessitates that the Light has to be separated into its own font family. The way the fonts are engineered at present give the most thorough formatting compatibility, accross platforms and documents possible.

Bruno Maag
Dalton Maag Ltd

Aller! Very nice, specially the Aller Display. Thank You!

Interesting typeface. Thank you.

Interesting typeface. Thank you.

Thanks very much for this typeface.

Regards

Thank you for your response and explanation Bruno!

I appreciate this face very much... I plan on giving it a proper workout very soon.

Mikey :-)

PS... I’m glad to see you have a US distributor too :-)

Dalton Maag

Thank you Bruno Maag and Dalton Maag, its a gem!

Next time I see you, Bruno. I'm going to ask you about this project.

Interesting concept for the EULA. The typeface isn't half bad either. ;^)

Very Nice. Especially the display face. Thank you

AWESOME!!! this font rocks, especially the Display!

are we authorized to use it in graphic creations like a logo for example?
I mean, if I sale a logo using this font, have i to pay something?

Read the EULA all the information is there.

Handpicked

I wish it weren't truetype, I don't know what to do with those. Maybe they work on the web? Not for print tho.

Patty they are True type flavored OpenType fonts. They work fine here, why do you say that?

Why not for print, Patty?

hey, is there a regualer italic? i can't seen to see it...

oh well, thanks anyway, they are nice!

ok, i found it... sorry....

Oh I see, they are open type. When I saw the suffix .ttf I assumed TrueType.

TrueType will still work on a majority of modern RIPs and printers. The days of PostScript-only presses are behind us.

Thank you, this is a very pleasant typeface. I especially like the regular lowercase “a” and uppercase “G”.

My philosophy of font marketing (and digital ethics) changed considerably when I read Chris Anderson’s essay on “Free” in Wired, although I haven’t got around to incorporating my new attitude into any marketing plans yet.

Nick, could you share your thoughts?
I have not found yet a convincing "philosophy of font marketing" and I was just talking with Chester of these things… Thanks!

P.S. What do you think, in general, of the idea of "bundling" typefaces with software applications, as the perception of the public it may be considerably reinforced (in ignorance) to perceive all works as "not to be paid"?

Maybe they work on the web? Not for print tho.

Rather for print than for screen, because there is no hinting.

I would like to ask how Unicode values for Small Capitals are assigned, since they are a "stylistic variation" and not included in Unicode. I see they are also different from the ones usually adopted by Adobe (forgive my question, but I am striving to build a sort of standard for myself…)

The Unicode code points are in the Private Area.

It is possible to include characters without a unicode code point, but this way the characters can be used with software that allows you to use any UC character (as opposed to programs that allows to select any character, such as InDesign).
It's not really necessary for the small caps function.

It is a very nice design, looks like Myriad but a bit less "cramped". Is it inspired by certain Dutch designs? (grin)

But Windows (on screen) doesn't really like it ... Is it still possible to add basic hinting?

.. InDesign doesn't like the family naming scheme!

It shows one group "Aller", containing Regular, Italic, Bold & Bold Italic, one group "Aller Light" with Light & Light Italic, and one group "Aller Display", with a single "Regular" font.

InDesign can handle some variations, but it seems their system is defeated here.

Thank you all for your comments. I am pretty chuffed with the design myself.

Yes, hinting: the font has been autohinted but that, of course, won't do the trick if good display is required. If we get some spare time and don't know what to do with our hands, we'll do some hard core VTT hinting on it.

Theunis, the font naming convention is intentional. This allows us the same naming for all applications, be they graphic or office. It also means that if a doc is created in one app, the doc can be opened, imported or whatever, in another wihtout losing the font name formatting. And since we're sticking with the 4-style font family it works fine in older versions of Win and Unix, too.

I realise that this may be a bit tedious for graphics users where you'd expect to see all styles in one font family. But it is a small price to pay for all round compatibility.

It is our policy to give all glyphs a Unicode value. I realise that a number of these are then put on private area. Not everyone may agree with this policy but I believe it is important to give access to these glyphs also to people who have no OT feature access, such as Word. And since it's Unicode, the glyphs can also be accessed using database driven copy, as long as the Unicodes are stringed correctly.

And then the question re TTF: it is our policy to produce TTF based OpenType fonts since we are confident that they work pretty reliably in a wide variety of environments. We create CFF based OT fonts only on demand.

Bruno Maag
Dalton Maag

Those are some good points you make. Every now & then I wake up to realize not everyone is using InDesign. (That day will come!)

My question re: low rez hinting is based upon my preference for high quality fonts for reading on screen, such as in Notepad (and as Windows default font for its windows as well). Oh well, I'll stick to (checking) hey, today it's Eurostile :-)

It sure looks to me as a very good book font -- I'm going to propose this to our clients. That's doctoral theses from our friendly local medicine university (Erasmus, Rotterdam) in small print runs (about 300), so don't expect to see one pop up in book stores near you soon. I'm pretty sure the EULA allows this (...)
Bruno, if you'd like to see one (if I can push it thru), I could send you a PDF.

The Unicode code points are in the Private Area.
Thanks. But, assumed I assign to Small Caps (or other stylistic variations) a Unicode value from the Private Range area, has a sort of "standard" been developed or not?
I was oriented to stick with Adobe values, and see those also for the Greek Small caps.

Maybe I should have posted in a separate topic, but I am interested to hear what Bruno Maag says on this, if it happens he passes again…

Thank you!

Claudio, the idea is to make a version of a product free to get it established, and then people will buy the non-free versions.

Adobe's document Unicode and Glyph Names, section 4, should answer the question. Also see, same document, the entire section 6, especially this part (quote):
The exceptions are the AGLv1.2 names which are associated with Unicode Private Use Area (PUA) values. These include all the superiors and small cap names. Use of these names will, for the purpose of searching text, lead some current implementations to map names like "Asmall" to the PUA Unicode value from AGL v1.2, rather than to the Unicode value for "A". We now recommend naming these glyphs according to the rules below.
Better only study Adobe's latest fonts like Arno Pro.

[Edit: Not meant as a comment about Aller Sans, only addressing Claudio's question. Point is, whether you use Adobe's earlier PUA codepoints or not, you should have a good reason for your decision.]

@Nick: Incredible how I realized this could be good, by experiencing it. It has already happened to me as a customer. And I think the "freebie" maybe does not even have to be a full-coverage weight. it's to test the quality… Great! Hope we'll talk about this…

@Karsten: How would I do without you? Thanks, I'll read them…

Claudio, AFAIK, "free" is one reason Helvetica etc. are top of the sales charts.
Partly an historical thing: free on Mac, then had to be licensed for PC?

I can't get the PC reference (I always used Macs), but thanks… :=)

i've often wondered why helvetica is still top of sales charts... thanks nick!

Theunis, hinting is always a nice thing to have. Unfortunately, the commercial reality is that is barely affordable to do for a foundry. It takes about six working days for a plain Latin font to be hinted to a good quality. If you add the S/C you'll increase that easily to eight days. No one is ever going to pay the premium for this in a retail product. The difference between a hinted v. unhinted font would be around £15 per font.

Yes, please do send me a PDF of the work. I would like to see it.

Re AGL1.2 and PUA - it appears that we haven't updated our encoding vectors. I am all for standards. We'll create future fonts to follow the AGL standard. But as explained above we had good reason for applying PUAs to the S/c.

Bruno

Actually, there is simple hinting that can be easily done to a font, in particular assigning values to standard stem widths and alignment zones, that sharpens things up considerably.

Miss Tiffany said: "Read the EULA all the information is there"

lol...
My english isn't enough good as I would like so this EULA is really MARTIAN for me :/
I just want a simple and clear answer:
Are we authorized to use this font in a logo?
YES or NO? nothing more...
thanks in advance...

If English is not your mother tongue you may be able to handle a general dialogue, with common words.
Whenever I use English I still feel handicapped, I can't express properly.
Should I express my thought with decent precision I'd have to formulate it in my language first, although the thought structure of any language is different.

@Bruno: what you say about production matters and hinting is very interesting.
How much time do you think it would take to develop a systematic production method (excluding hinting), and how much did you learn in time from the work of colleagues / other foundries?
Is that so different for a small foundry and a bigger one? I guess it all depends on how much you relate to "standards" or stray from them, anyway.
That's probably why I find so difficult to build one for myself… :=(

Oh I see, they are open type. When I saw the suffix .ttf I assumed TrueType.

The suffix is the same, because it really doesn't matter. TrueType and OpenType (with TT outlines) is basically is the same thing. The myth that TrueTypes are bad needs to be buried.
In fact, as far as I understand many of Bruno’s postings, they even prefer TrueType/OT TT over CFF-flavoured OpenType because they considered it even a little bit more stable and compatible.

Ralf, I just prefer OT-flavored since when I have to edit or modify outlines to create logos or to add weight, I have fewer control points, and it's a lot better for editing.

In general I follow the criteria to buy licenses for TTF if I have to use faces also for screen work, otherwise I buy OTF.

The myth that TrueTypes are bad needs to be buried.

It's not a myth. In many cases TrueType fonts are not as good as Type1 for display work.

When a font is created with PostScript curves, some distortion occurs when it's converted to TrueType curves, which happens automatically during the font generation process. If my practice is typical, type designers will generally draw their glyphs in PostScript mode, and not redraw glyphs to correct the distortions for TrueType generation. So there will be slight artifacts in the TrueType versions, that may occasionally mar the appearance of type at large display size.

> It’s not a myth. In many cases TrueType fonts are not as good as Type1 for display work.

If they aren't as good it's the designer's fault, not a font format problem or limitation.

8 days without any answer...
I must have to consider this silence as an authorization...
So I'll use this font in my future logo creations...
Thanks anyway.
Regards.

YES!!!!!! Sorry about that Vivio :-)

If they aren’t as good it’s the designer’s fault, not a font format problem or limitation.

One could also blame history (the circumstance that saw the design industry using Type1 fonts and everyone else TrueType), or software such as FontLab, which creates the artefacts during conversion from PostScript curves to TrueType.

But I'm not trying to place blame, only trying to tell it like it is.

And it's not really a fault to publish a font that's almost perfect -- after all, as Bruno notes, very few fonts have full, character-by-character hinting.

It probably depends on how delicate the curves (or thin the stems) are…
Although the automatic addition of points does not seem to bring so much distortion in the majority of curves. It would probably be crucial when you have short segments inclined, where the addition of a TT control point would move or alter the curve…

I just joined the ranks of appreciative typophiles with Aller Sans. Thanks.

"If you hit a wrong note, it’s the next note that you play that makes it good or bad" - Miles Davis

I used Aller Light & Regular with my new business header, see below. Thanks!

I wanted a text font very clean and smooth, but also with a slight warmth to it. Museo was close, but too rounded compared to the logo. Aller looks just right, I think.

thanks a lot.

> So there will be slight artifacts in the TrueType versions

Not if you know to avoid certain structures in the original cubics.
One such trick is mentioned in the Curves section here:
http://themicrofoundry.com/s_quality.html

hhp

Just wanted to say Thank You for a very very good font. As a signmaker, I'm usually excited by more gimicky fonts, but am actually excited by Aller. Esthetically, I find it very easy to use attractively. I don't know to what extent signage and long-distance legibility was considered or needed by the DSMJ, but I'm finding Aller very effective in that regard.

What happens in 2 years? I want to use the font legitimately.

Thanks so much!

Aller Sans in use!!!

http://search.mylife.com/a/whos-searching-for-you?aid=Surge%20Marketing%...

Aller Sans in use again:
http://www.unieq.nl/

> What happens in 2 years? I want to use the font legitimately.

Licences awarded now are perpetual. The only limit is that the number of users is never above 25 in those organizations which have acquired free licences.

When distribution rights revert to us it will become a member of our retail library, but the free licences will still stand. Those organizations needing more than 25 users will at that point be able to buy more.

Dave

Aller Sans looks amazing here:
http://www.formspring.com/

Very web 2.0

Hi there. I have more confusion regarding the license for this free font. I'm working on a web project, and I was under the impression, based on the attached license, that embedding it in a website (via @font-face) was allowable. Though it isn't exclusively mentioned, it does say this:
Font Software may be used to create or distribute any electronic document in which the Font Software, or any part thereof, is embedded in a format that permits editing, alterations, enhancements, or modifications by the recipient of such document.

However, I was having second thoughts and did a google seach for "embed "aller font"" and got this hit:
Web Embedding Aller FAQ - Dalton Maag (http://www.daltonmaag.com/about/aller_faq.html)
which explicitly disallows this use. However, it seems to be in the context of a paid font, and nowhere else on the site can I even *find* Aller, so I don't know if it applies to the free version of the font or not.

Can you let me know where embedding via @font-face is allowed for this free version? Thanks!

Kerri, it seems pretty clear to me that the page you cite does apply to the free version. If so, embedding of Aller Sans is only allowed in EOT format (so, you can use it with @font-face with Internet Explorer only). However, Dalton Maag permits you to use a solution such as FLIR as long as you aren't concurrently serving up more than 25 pages that use the font. As they point out in the general FAQ, web pages get served up pretty darn fast, so that limit is probably not a big deal for most websites, assuming you're only using it for headings and not as a text face.

I'm still a little confused with this EULA, so I thought it best to just ask here.. I am developing an iPhone game that I'm going to sell through the iTunes store. I would like to use this font in parts of the interface.. I'm obviously not selling the font, but the font has to be included in the binary.. is that possible through this EULA? Thanks.

I'm no lawyer and I'm not affiliated with Dalton Maag, but the way I read the EULA that wouldn't be allowed. The first sentence of paragraph 14 states pretty clearly:

14 You may not rent, lease, sublicense, give, lend, or further distribute the Font Software, or any copy thereof, except as expressly provided herein.

There are plenty of fonts out there with licenses that would work for you. You might consider the Bitstream Vera fonts.