August 2004
Beginner to intermediate
208 pages
8h 3m
English
Content preview from Understanding Open Source and Free Software LicensingBecome an O’Reilly member and get unlimited access to this title plus top books and audiobooks from O’Reilly and nearly 200 top publishers, thousands of courses curated by job role, 150+ live events each month,
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Choosing an Open Source or Free Software License
Choosing an open source or free software license is more often the result of circumstances than the unfettered discretion of a particular programmer. While each of the licenses described in this book (which represent only a selection of the open source and free software licenses in use) presents its own advantages and disadvantages, in many situations, the decision as to which license to apply will already have been made.
A typical route to involvement in an open source or free software project comes from contributing to an already existing project. Whether by submitting a patch to Linux or a bug report to a less well-established open development project, consideration of the license applicable to the project is generally a secondary consideration at most. A user submitting a bug report does not generally care about the license of the program to which the bug report applies. So long as that user can reasonably expect some benefit from the submission of the bug report, usually in the form of an improved program, that user will make a submission.
Users frequently make even more substantial contributions to open development projects without much more consideration. Again using Linux as an example, scores of programmers have submitted and continued to submit patches or more substantial contributions to Linux without troubling themselves to any great extent about the terms of the GPL applicable to Linux.
A programmer may undertake even ...
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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.
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