Open Source

Licenses
Software Licenses
⚫ A license is an official permission or permit to do, use, or own
something.
⚫ Simply it is the authorization to use software.

⚫ All software is protected under copyright. Copyright is owned by the

developer or publisher.
⚫ Software License is a LICENSE for the copyright in the software

⚫ License is generally just a permission to use

⚫ Does not result in change in ownership

⚫ Implemented through a legal contract, i.e., subject to terms and conditions

Classification of Software Licenses

Free & Open

Proprietary Source Hybrids
(FOSS)

Developers or Grants a user

distributors substantial rights Combination of
reserve all and freedoms. FOSS with a
freedoms and Proprietary license
rights.

Rights to redistribute,
Most commercially study and modify free
available software is software owing to
covered under access to its source code
proprietary licenses without any royalty
Provides flexibility
of both proprietary
and FOSS
licensing models
Licensing
⚫ Licensing or grant license means to get permission or
authority.
⚫ A licensor may grant a license under intellectual
property laws to authorize a use (such as copying
software or using an invention) to a licensee, sparing
the licensee from a claim of infringement brought by
the licensor.
 Common FOSS License Requirements
⚫ Provide OSS recipients with certain OSS notices such as the text of the
OS license, notice of OSS use, author attributions, warranty
disclaimers, descriptions of modifications, or offers for source code.
⚫ Provide OSS recipients with the “corresponding source code” and
other supporting materials for OSS distributed in non-source form
(binary, byte code, et cetera).
⚫ Grant outbound IP licenses covering OSS or derivatives or impose IP
enforcement penalties (such as OSS license termination) for asserting
IP against the OSS or contributors.
⚫ Grant OSS recipients certain additional use and development rights
such as the right to replace or reverse engineer the OS software or to
“crack” any anti-circumvention protection limiting access to the OS
software.

5
FOSS VS Commercial Licensing
Open-Source License
⚫ An open source license is a copyright license for computer software

that allows the source code to be used, modified and/or shared under
defined terms and conditions.

⚫ This allows end users to review and modify the source code for their

own customization, curiosity or troubleshooting needs.

Category of OSS Licenses

OSS

Copyleft Permissive

Strong Copyleft

Weak Copyleft
Copyleft Licenses
⚫ Copyleft is the practice of using copyright law to offer the right to

distribute copies and modified versions of a work and requiring that the
same rights be preserved in modified versions of the work.

⚫ Any works derived from a work with a copyleft license must

themselves be copyleft when distribute.

⚫ E.g.
GNU General Public License (GPL)
Strong Copyleft Licenses
⚫ The copyleft governing a work is considered to be "stronger", to the extent

that the copyleft provisions can be efficiently imposed on all kinds of derived

works.

⚫ That is derivative works must be licensed in source form under the same

copyleft license.

⚫ The most well known free software license that uses strong copyleft is

⚫ GNU General Public License.

Weak Copyleft Licenses
⚫ "Weak copyleft" refers to licenses where not all derived works inherit

the copyleft license; whether a derived work inherits or not often

depends on the manner in which it was derived.

⚫ Free software licenses that use "weak" copyleft include

⚫ GNU Lesser General Public License

⚫ Mozilla Public License.

Permissive Licenses
⚫ A "permissive" license is basically a non-copyleft license.

⚫ Permissive licenses typically allow licensees to use, distribute and

modify the licensed material, for almost any purpose, including

distributing the licensed material as part of a FOSS (Free/Open-Source
Software) licensed project, or a proprietary-licensed project.

⚫ E.g.
BSD License
MIT License
Identify license type based on the given feature:
⚫ Code under this license can be linked with the proprietary code that is

developed in the companies.

⚫ Companies and individuals that write code and release it under this

license get access to the large amount of the existing code under the
same license.

⚫ This kind of license allows developers and companies to use and

integrate the software into their own (even proprietary) software

without being required to release the source code of their own
software-parts.
Popular Licenses
⚫ General Public License (GPL)

⚫ GNU Library or "Lesser" General Public License (LGPL)

⚫ Mozilla Public License

⚫ Apache License

⚫ BSD style license

⚫ MIT license
GNU General Public License (GPL)
⚫ The GPL was created by Richard Stallman in order to protect GNU software

from being made proprietary. GPL is under the copyright ownership of the Free

Software Foundation (FSF).

⚫ The GPL is a copyleft license, which means that derived works can only be

distributed under the same license terms.

⚫ GPL ensures every user receives the essential freedoms that define "free“

software, which is free of restrictions.

⚫ Basically, it allows users to legally copy, distribute and modify software.

GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL)
⚫ The GNU Lesser General Public License or LGPL is a free software license

published by the Free Software Foundation (FSF).

⚫ The LGPL allows developers and companies to use and integrate LGPL

software into their own (even proprietary) software without being required to
release the source code of their own software-parts.

⚫ The word "Lesser" in the title of the license is used, to show that LGPL cannot

guarantee end-users complete freedom in the use of software, because only

the LGPL-parts guarantee end-users the access to source code and therefore the
freedom of modification.
Mozilla Public License
⚫ The Mozilla Public License (MPL) is a free and open source software

license developed and maintained by the Mozilla Foundation.

⚫ It is a weak copyleft license, that seeks to balance the concerns of

proprietary and open source developers.[

Apache License
⚫ The Apache License is a permissive free software license written by

the Apache Software Foundation (ASF).

⚫ The license allows the user of the software the freedom to use the

software for any purpose, to distribute it, to modify it, and to distribute
modified versions of the software, under the terms of the license,
without concern for royalties.

⚫ The ASF and its projects release the software they produce under the

Apache License. The license is also used by many non-ASF projects.

BSD licenses
⚫ BSD(Berkeley Software Distribution) licenses are a family of permissive free

software licenses, imposing minimal restrictions on the use and distribution of

covered software.

⚫ This is in contrast to copyleft licenses.

⚫ The original version has since been revised, and its descendants are referred to

as modified BSD licenses.

⚫ The BSD license is a simple license that merely requires that all code be

licensed under the BSD license if redistributed in source code format. BSD
(unlike some other licenses) does not require that source code be distributed at
all.
MIT License
⚫ The MIT License is a permissive free software license originating at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
⚫ As a permissive license, it puts only very limited restriction on reuse and
has, therefore, an excellent license compatibility.
⚫ The MIT license permits reuse within proprietary software provided that all
copies of the licensed software include a copy of the MIT License terms and
the copyright notice.
⚫ The MIT license is also compatible with many copyleft licenses, such as the
GNU General Public License (GPL);
⚫ MIT licensed software can be integrated into GPL software, but not the other
way around.
Open Source Licensing Strategy
⚫ Optimization Strategy :
⚫ It is an open source manifestation of clayton christensen’s “law of

conservation of modularity”
⚫ One layer of a software stack is “modular and conformable”,

allowing adjacent software layers to be optimized.

⚫ Example :

⚫ Linux Operating System.

Open Source Licensing Strategy
⚫ Dual License Strategy :
⚫ A software company offers free use of its software with some

limitations, or alternatively offers for a fee commercial distribution

rights and a larger set of features.

⚫ The Consulting Strategy :

⚫ Software licenses are earning a smaller portion of information

technology (IT) investment, while consulting and service continue to

rise.
Open Source Licensing Strategy
⚫ The Subscription Strategy :
⚫ Revenues from services which includes both maintenance and

consulting are increase in proportion relative to revenues from

licenses.

⚫ The Patronage(support) Strategy :

⚫ The patron must deliver source code, clustering, availability, provisioning,

security and management software.

Open Source Licensing Strategy
⚫ The Hosted Strategy :
⚫ It won’t allow to sell their software, but let users to use it or rent it.

⚫ Ex : eBay

⚫ The Embedded Strategy :

⚫ Linux is an operating system used in more than half of the embedded
systems market.
⚫ It has been used in devices and also products .

⚫ Used from servers to cell phones.