February 2008
Intermediate to advanced
285 pages
7h 6m
English
book
The Open Source Alternative: Understanding Risks and Leveraging Opportunities
by Heather J. Meeker
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O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.
Chapter 2. Free Software and Open Source
Viruses and Freedoms
The first thing any lawyer learns about open source is that there are two kinds of open source licenses: "viral" and "nonviral."
When lawyers use the term "viral," they are referring to a license condition that requires the licensee to redistribute source code in outbound licenses only on the same terms as the inbound license. Although many find this a difficult concept, it is not fundamentally different from licensing conditions common in proprietary software licensing—a paradigm with which most licensing lawyers and businesspeople are quite familiar.
Consider, for example, the typical original equipment manufacturer (OEM) source code software distribution agreement. Such an agreement typically grants the OEM licensee the right to redistribute copies of software, subject to certain flow-down provisions that restrict the terms on which the OEM may grant end user licenses. Exhibit 2.1 shows some similarities and differences between a viral license agreement and an OEM source code license agreement.
Thus, the flow–down provisions of the GNU General Public License (GPL), in scope and structure, are not unlike those of OEM contracts that have been used in the software business for many years.
Terminology in this area is fraught with peril. The term "viral" is a pejorative term that is not well received by software developers. In addition, the term "viral" is imprecise, because sometimes it is used to refer only to the GNU General ...
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O’Reilly covers everything we've got, with content to help us build a world-class technology community, upgrade the capabilities and competencies of our teams, and improve overall team performance as well as their engagement.Julian F.
I wanted to learn C and C++, but it didn't click for me until I picked up an O'Reilly book. When I went on the O’Reilly platform, I was astonished to find all the books there, plus live events and sandboxes so you could play around with the technology.Addison B.
I’ve been on the O’Reilly platform for more than eight years. I use a couple of learning platforms, but I'm on O'Reilly more than anybody else. When you're there, you start learning. I'm never disappointed.Amir M.
I'm always learning. So when I got on to O'Reilly, I was like a kid in a candy store. There are playlists. There are answers. There's on-demand training. It's worth its weight in gold, in terms of what it allows me to do.