The document provides an overview of open-source software licenses, emphasizing the importance of intellectual property rights in software, including copyrights, patents, and trademarks. It outlines the principles of open-source, detailing various licenses like the GPL and Apache License, and their associated freedoms and obligations. Additionally, it discusses challenges in license selection and compatibility, along with some practical tips for applying licenses to software.

1. Open Source Software
Licenses
Victor Rodriguez Doncel <vrodriguez@fi.upm.es>
Nandana Mihindukulasooriya <nmihindu@fi.upm.es>
Ontology Engineering Group (OEG)
Facultad de Informática
Universidad Politécnica de Madrid

2. Intellectual property basics
• Patents
• protects inventions (novel, useful, and non-obvious)
• the right to exclude others from making, using, offering for sale, selling, or importing
• public disclosure of the inventions
• Copyrights
• Unique expression of ideas (original works of authorship)
• exclusive rights to reproduce the copyrighted work, to prepare derivative works, to
distribute copies of the copyrighted work, to perform the copyrighted work publicly,
or to display the copyrighted work publicly
• Trademarks
• a name, phrase, or symbol that Identifies a source for product or service
• prevent others from using a confusingly similar mark
• Trade secrets
• Secret information with an economic value
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

3. Software is intellectual property
• Software  Intellectual Property
• Source code
• Copyrighted (Expression of an idea)
• Patentable (Innovative algorithms, improvements)
• Can contain trademarks (Provenance)
• Is it legal ?
• modify / derivative works
• redistribute
• sell
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

4. Free Software Foundatation
• The freedom to run the program, for any purpose (freedom 0).
• The freedom to study how the program works, and change it so it
does your computing as you wish (freedom 1). Access to the source
code is a precondition for this.
• The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbor
(freedom 2).
• The freedom to distribute copies of your modified versions to
others (freedom 3). By doing this you can give the whole
community a chance to benefit from your changes. Access to the
source code is a precondition for this.
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

5. Open Source Initiative
1. Free redistribution, royalty free
2. Availability of source code
3. Right to modify and create derived works
4. Integrity of the author's source code
5. No discrimination against persons or groups
6. No discrimination against fields of endeavor
7. Distribution of license
8. License must not be specific to a product
9. License must not restrict other software
10. License must be Technology-Neutral
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

6. Software Licenses
• Software without licenses
• Intellectual Property Laws apply
• Copyrighted by default (Berne Convention)
• Licenses are used to explicitly express
• Rights
• Obligations
• Conditions
• Warranty disclaimers
• Important when delivering software
• Users are can make decisions whether or not to use the software
<<K-CAP, September 2nd, 2009, California, USA>> 6

7. WTFPL & BEER-ware
DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT TO PUBLIC LICENSE
Version 2, December 2004
Copyright (C) 2004 Sam Hocevar <sam@hocevar.net>
Everyone is permitted to copy and distribute verbatim or modified
copies of this license document, and changing it is allowed as long
as the name is changed.
DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT TO PUBLIC LICENSE
TERMS AND CONDITIONS FOR COPYING, DISTRIBUTION AND MODIFICATION
0. You just DO WHAT THE FUCK YOU WANT TO.
/*
* ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
* "THE BEER-WARE LICENSE" (Revision 42):
* <phk@FreeBSD.ORG> wrote this file. As long as you retain this notice you
* can do whatever you want with this stuff. If we meet some day, and you think
* this stuff is worth it, you can buy me a beer in return Poul-Henning Kamp
* ----------------------------------------------------------------------------
*/
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

8. BSD 3-Clause License
Copyright (c) <YEAR>, <OWNER>
All rights reserved.
Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided
that the following conditions are met:
•Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and
the following disclaimer.
•Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions
and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the
distribution.
•Neither the name of the <ORGANIZATION> nor the names of its contributors may be used to
endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.
THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS "AS IS"
AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT HOLDER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE
LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR
CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF
SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS
INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN
CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING
IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
SUCH DAMAGE.
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

9. Some more verbose licenses
• GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE
http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html
• Apache License, Version 2.0
http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0.txt
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

10. Open Source License Proliferation
• More than 2200 licenses
• Popular OSS licenses
License %
GNU General Public License (GPL) 2.0 32.65%
Apache License 2.0 12.84%
GNU General Public License (GPL) 3.0 11.62%
MIT License 11.28%
BSD License 2.0 6.83%
Artistic License (Perl) 6.27%
GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL) 2.1 6.19%
GNU Lesser General Public License (LGPL) 3.0 2.62%
Eclipse Public License (EPL) 1.61%
Code Project Open 1.02 License 1.33%
Microsoft Public License 1.32%
Mozilla Public License (MPL) 1.1 1.08%
Common Development and Distribution License (CDDL) 0.31%
BSD 2-clause "Simplified" or "FreeBSD" License 0.30%
Common Public License (CPL) 0.26%
http://osrc.blackducksoftware.com/data/licenses/ (Data from over 900K projects)
10
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

11. License Types
• Main types
• Public domain
• Permissive
• Weak copyleft
• Copyleft
• Network Protective
• Dual licensing
• A business model
• A compatability hack
11
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

12. License Compatibility
Diagram credit - Carlo Daffara - http://timreview.ca/article/416
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

13. Challenges
• Selecting a suitable license
• What is the goal of making my code open source ?
• Do I want my code to remain in same licensing conditions ?
• Do I want to be business friendly ?
• Etc.
• Ensuring Compatibility
• Third-party dependencies
• Honoring the attributions and other obligations
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
13

14. Applying the Apache License (I)
• Guidelines followed by ASF projects
• License header in all the source files
• LICENSE and NOTICE files in the top directory of your distribution
• LICENSE
• copy of the Apache license text
http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0.txt
• References to third-party licenses
e.g. - http://incubator.apache.org/guides/examples/LICENSE
• NOTICE
• to collect copyright notices and required attributions (AL 4.d)
• the standard author and copyright notice
• inherited copyright and attributions notices
• all attribution and copyright notices required by licenses for
third party documents
• E.g. - http://www.apache.org/licenses/example-NOTICE.txt
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
14

15. Applying the Apache License (II) – License Template
• Boilerplate license header in all source files
Copyright [yyyy] [name of copyright owner]
Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
You may obtain a copy of the License at
http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either
express or implied.
See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
limitations under the License.
15
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

16. Applying the Apache License (III) - NOTICE
• Reflects the product name and year(s) of distribution of the current and
past versions of the product
• Collects copyright notices and required attributions
[PRODUCT_NAME]
Copyright [yyyy] [name of copyright owner]
This product includes software developed at
[Organization Name][Organization URL].
Portions of this software were developed at XYZ Org.
This project contains code derived from ABC project / book / etc.
Copyright (c) [years] [Original Authours]. See [url]
16
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

17. Some helpful tools
• Apache Rat – A release audit
http://creadur.apache.org/rat/
• Maven Release Plugin
http://maven.apache.org/maven-release/maven-release-plugin/
• Apache Creadur
http://creadur.apache.org/
• Eclipse Code Templates (Default license header comment)
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/
17

18. References
• http://opensource.org/licenses
• http://www.softwarefreedom.org/resources/
• http://www.cs.miami.edu/~burt/learning/Csc322.052/doc
s/opensourcedmk.pdf
• http://euro.ecom.cmu.edu/program/law/08-
732/Transactions/LegalIssuesNimmer.pdf
• http://eprints.qut.edu.au/5758/
• http://oreilly.com/openbook/osfreesoft/book/ch01.pdf
• http://www.codinghorror.com/blog/2007/04/pick-a-
license-any-license.html
• http://www.apache.org/dev/apply-license.html
• http://www.apache.org/legal/src-headers.html
18
© 2013, OEG. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 license, http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/