Add static font format builds to the repository releases

[chrissimpkins]

Dave is working with our engineering team to eliminate static instances in the Fonts zip archive downloads. Android Studio needs the static format files to support the editor in Linux environments.

Let's begin making static instance builds in our repository releases. I don't feel strongly about whether this is by compiling directly from sources to statics vs. slicing statics from the default variable fonts. Let's discuss pros/cons of the two approaches and decide how to move forward.

This is not an urgent need for our upcoming April 2025 release. But I would like to have it in place before our final scheduled 2025 release on the May/June timeframe.

[MariannaPaszkowska]

Simon wrote a VF slicing tool a long time ago, but it uses his own Rust font library, because at the time when he worked on it the GF one didn't exist yet. https://github.com/simoncozens/rust-font-tools/blob/main/fonttools-cli/src/bin/ttf-instantiate.rs

we should keep an eye on the official GF subsetter (which doesn't support vfs just yet): https://github.com/googlefonts/fontations/tree/main/klippa

[chrissimpkins]

The internal pipeline transition to remove the static font format in zip archives has not taken place yet. We will not need this support as of the upcoming v5.000 release. Will tentatively keep this tracker on a v6.000 release milestone, tentatively aligned with our fontc compiler transition release. That release is tentatively scheduled later this month.

cc @rsheeter @anthrotype

[belluzj]

fontc can only:

• build VFs, which can be sliced into statics separately (preferred approach probably)
• or build a single static UFO into a static TTF, but the static UFO would be generated separately beforehand.

We would need to choose a VF slicing tool and integrate into the workflow. The most mature options as far as I know are fontTools and hb-subset.

[chrissimpkins]

@anthrotype @rsheeter are there plans for a varLib.instancer replacement in Rust?

[chrissimpkins]

Moving this out of the v6.000 milestone. We don't need it for the v6.0 release

[emmamarichal]

Same as metatable parameter, this can be added for the next release @MariannaPaszkowska

[theoparis]

It seems like this would be needed to make a patched nerd-font version of this font 👀