Re: [css3-fonts] CSS3 font-weight, OFF OS2.usWeightClass, and weights which are not a multiple of 100.

John D.,

"If you think there are situations that require a more complicated matching system, please explain what those situations are and why a more complex model is required."

I think the off specification describes world standards for recording width and weight to cover all situations publishing should encounter. Regardless of the OS or Application hoops jumped through in the mighty transition we're in, that specification works well from a founder's perspective. 

So, maybe from a CSS perspective I need to know how to treat the "matching" in an example family, so that it fits the CSS specification.

I have 8 weights, for mercy sake, I'll call them 200 through 900. 200 and 900 are sensitive to changes in rendering and background. So clustered around 200 and 900 are 10 addition weights, 170 to 256, e.g. without width change (aka "grades"). 300 is regular, and for print use it is one of 5 grades... Where are we? 22 weights. 500 has grades too for 27. But that is just in foundry, No CSS problem here.

So how can I help you? I am a client now and I want a family with five weights to span the size spectrum of the presentation. Web type offers the possibility that besides these five, I will use a second and third grade of 200 for my white type on a black background, one each for Mac and windows and different grades of 200, 300 and 500 for windows users, white on black. And then I decide the bold text on windows needs to be 540.

Regardless of what one might think of this excess, of the remoteness of its possible occurrence, we are talking about a world standard for controlling print and web publishing. So first tell me what exactly you want whom to do, at what point from foundry to website, to get a 11 weight family in use, into 10 slots? and then maybe we can balance that out vs the 0-999 as specified not-quite-well-enough in off?