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Designer field missing

Audit code: naming-designer-missing

Definition

Designer field is empty. The name appears in OS font browsers and any metadata-aware tool — leaving it blank shows "Unknown".

How Patens surfaces this

The Patens audit module checks for naming-designer-missing across five teaching surfaces: the edit-panel inline issue list, the project-wide audit page, the release pre-flight check, the family hub, and the home-page project tile. Every surface shows the same plain-English explanation and links back to this page. This rule is detection-only — there's no automatic fix because the correction is design-dependent (it requires a judgment call about the glyph's intended shape or the font's intended behaviour). The audit message links to the specific glyph or field that needs attention.

Run this check yourself

Patens runs every audit rule live as you draw — including this one. The editor (in private alpha) shows naming-designer-missing firing on real glyphs, or check your own work from the CLI:

npx patens audit your-project.font.json

Canonical references

Primary literature where this rule is established or explained. Drawn from the open-licensed corpus — browse the full 42-source canonical library or read the research artifact.

  • OpenType Specification 1.9.1

    Microsoft Typography · 1997 · Microsoft Corporation· § name table — nameID 9

    Designer attribution is required by most font licenses; missing it leaves the designer un-creditable in font-pickers.

Related rules in Family naming

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