OpenType SVG fonts coming to Windows 10 Anniversary Update this summer

During the keynote talk at the Microsoft Build conference, at 2:22:51 Kevin
Gallo showed a slide outlining the new developer-related features of the
Windows 10 Anniversary Update that will ship in the summer. One item stuck
out to me as a nice surprise: “OpenType SVG color fonts”:
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10154033931238764

We’ve come a long way since I proposed the marriage of SVG and OpenType as
a way to get multi-color and typographically sophisticated fonts. I posted
this on several discussion lists back in June 2011:
https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-webfonts-wg/2011Jun/0112.html

My proposal was met with some reluctance on one hand, but keen interest on
the other. In October 2011, Sairus Patel from Adobe presented the first
draft of a specification detailing how SVG glyph descriptions could be
placed inside OpenType fonts. We have formed a working group within the W3C
consortium: https://www.w3.org/community/svgopentype/ and two years later,
the group has presented a final specification. In March 2015, the OpenType
font format specification was updated to version 1.7 and added the support
for SVG glyph descriptions:
https://www.microsoft.com/typography/otspec/svg.htm

Mozilla Firefox was the first app that actually implemented OpenType SVG
color fonts, and FontLab quickly followed with the free FontLab Pad app:
http://www.fontlab.com/fontlab-pad/

Yet the future of OpenType SVG was still unsure. OpenType SVG color fonts
can be created with FontLab VI (
http://www.fontlab.com/font-editor/fontlab-vi/ ) and TransType 4 (
http://www.fontlab.com/font-converter/transtype/ ), but there are still
some glitches we need to iron out. But now, we know that it actually is
worth the effort — because OpenType SVG color fonts are coming to Windows!

Many thanks to all my colleagues at FontLab, Adobe, Microsoft, Mozilla,
Monotype, the W3 Consortium and other groups and companies who’ve worked
over the last five years to turn my simple modest idea into reality! :)

Best,
Adam

Ps. The Microsoft Build conference keynote can be watched at:
http://techcrunch.com/2016/03/30/how-to-watch-the-microsoft-build-2016-keynote-live-stream/