Which License Should I Use?

[mojosam]

I've been watching the flame war about licenses with some interest.
There are many motivations for those who participate in this sector, so
disagreements over licenses reflect those agendas.

I don't have an agenda, at least not right now. I do plan on writing a
few programs.

These will be tools I need for firmware testing. They will be
relatively simple things like tools for breaking down data by its
structure for easy viewing, sending commands/macros over serial ports,
etc. Similar things exist, but they don't do everything I need. These
will also be excellent learning opportunities for me, since I'm still
pretty shaky on Python.

How do I decide on a license? Are there any web sites that summarize
the pros and cons? I guess I don't care too much about how other
people use it. These things won't be comprehensive enough or have
broad enough appeal that somebody will slap a new coat of paint on them
and try to sell them. I guess I don't care if somebody incorporates
them into something bigger. If somebody were to add features to them,
it would be nice to get the code and keep the derivative work as open
source, but I don't think that matters all that much to me. If
somebody can add value and find a way of making money at it, I don't
think I'd be too upset.

I will be doing the bulk of the coding on my own time, because I need
to be able to take these tools with me when I change employers.
However, I'm sure that in the course of using these tools, I will need
to spend time on the job debugging or tweaking them. I do not want my
current employer to have any claim on my code in any way. Usually if
you program on company time, that makes what you do a "work for hire".
I can't contaminate my code like that. Does that mean the GPL is the
strongest defense in this situation?

I'm open to suggestions as to which licenses to consider. However,
please try to keep the conversation to the decision process or what
sounds like it is best for this purpose. Let's keep the broader issue
of which license will bring about the fall of Western Civilization on
the other thread.

Ron Britton

(The gibberish on the next line really is my email address.)
nk67v8o02
at
sneakemail.com

[Mike Meyer]

"mojosam" <nk*******@snea kemail.com> writes:

I will be doing the bulk of the coding on my own time, because I need
to be able to take these tools with me when I change employers.
However, I'm sure that in the course of using these tools, I will need
to spend time on the job debugging or tweaking them. I do not want my
current employer to have any claim on my code in any way. Usually if
you program on company time, that makes what you do a "work for hire".
I can't contaminate my code like that. Does that mean the GPL is the
strongest defense in this situation?

IANAL, but I don't believe the GPL helps in this situation. It places
conditions on redistributing the code; it doesn't force you to
redistribute modifieed code. Your employers could refuse to let you
take the code with you because they own partial copyright on it. They
couldn't sell it later because of the GPL on it, but that's not your
issue here.

I tend to try to get clients to agree that code that comes in from
outside can go back out under whatever license it came in on. That
makes it clear up front that the results go back to the community,
which means you can get at them.

If you deal with this issue, the license that best meets your
description are the BSD-like license, which have been called
"copycenter " licenses. They place no restrictions whatsoever on the
the further use.

<mike
--
Mike Meyer <mw*@mired.or g> http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/
Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information.

[Robert Kern]

mojosam wrote:

I will be doing the bulk of the coding on my own time, because I need
to be able to take these tools with me when I change employers.
However, I'm sure that in the course of using these tools, I will need
to spend time on the job debugging or tweaking them. I do not want my
current employer to have any claim on my code in any way. Usually if
you program on company time, that makes what you do a "work for hire".
I can't contaminate my code like that. Does that mean the GPL is the
strongest defense in this situation?

Not at all. The code that you write on your employer's time probably
belongs to the employer (you'll need to read your contract and the
relevant state law or talk to a competent lawyer in your area for full
details). Just because you added that code to a GPLed project doesn't
mean that the added code would be released under the GPL. If your
employer had an interest in keeping you from using it after you left
them, they simply wouldn't release the code at all. They wouldn't be
able to turn it into a proprietary project using your GPLed code, but
they could prevent you from taking the added code with you.

Also, the employer may still own the copyright on software that you
write on your own time if it substantially relates to your job (as it
seems it does). Again, you will have to read your contract and the
relevant state law or possibly talk to a lawyer to find out. I am not
such a lawyer, and, of course, none of this is legal advice.

That said, assuming that you can release the code under an open source
license and given your lack of an agenda, the BSD license seems
appropriate. You may also want to read this Licensing HOWTO:

http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/Licensing-HOWTO.html

It's a draft, but it contains useful information. Also, Larry Rosen's
book _Open Source Licensing_ is quite helpful (and free!).

http://rosenlaw.com/oslbook.htm

--
Robert Kern
ro*********@gma il.com

"In the fields of hell where the grass grows high
Are the graves of dreams allowed to die."
-- Richard Harter

[Björn Lindström]

Mike Meyer <mw*@mired.or g> writes:

IANAL, but I don't believe the GPL helps in this situation. It places
conditions on redistributing the code; it doesn't force you to
redistribute modifieed code. Your employers could refuse to let you
take the code with you because they own partial copyright on it. They
couldn't sell it later because of the GPL on it, but that's not your
issue here.

If they have the rights to the code, they can sell it, under the GPL or
any license of their choosing. In addition, if you GPL it, your employer
will be able to sell it, just like anyone else.

--
Björn Lindström <bk**@stp.lingf il.uu.se>
Student of computational linguistics, Uppsala University, Sweden

[Paul Watson]

mojosam wrote:

I've been watching the flame war about licenses with some interest.
There are many motivations for those who participate in this sector, so
disagreements over licenses reflect those agendas.

I don't have an agenda, at least not right now. I do plan on writing a
few programs.

These will be tools I need for firmware testing. They will be
relatively simple things like tools for breaking down data by its
structure for easy viewing, sending commands/macros over serial ports,
etc. Similar things exist, but they don't do everything I need. These
will also be excellent learning opportunities for me, since I'm still
pretty shaky on Python.

How do I decide on a license? Are there any web sites that summarize
the pros and cons? I guess I don't care too much about how other
people use it. These things won't be comprehensive enough or have
broad enough appeal that somebody will slap a new coat of paint on them
and try to sell them. I guess I don't care if somebody incorporates
them into something bigger. If somebody were to add features to them,
it would be nice to get the code and keep the derivative work as open
source, but I don't think that matters all that much to me. If
somebody can add value and find a way of making money at it, I don't
think I'd be too upset.

I will be doing the bulk of the coding on my own time, because I need
to be able to take these tools with me when I change employers.
However, I'm sure that in the course of using these tools, I will need
to spend time on the job debugging or tweaking them. I do not want my
current employer to have any claim on my code in any way. Usually if
you program on company time, that makes what you do a "work for hire".
I can't contaminate my code like that. Does that mean the GPL is the
strongest defense in this situation?

I'm open to suggestions as to which licenses to consider. However,
please try to keep the conversation to the decision process or what
sounds like it is best for this purpose. Let's keep the broader issue
of which license will bring about the fall of Western Civilization on
the other thread.

Ron Britton

(The gibberish on the next line really is my email address.)
nk67v8o02
at
sneakemail.com

As mentioned earlier, your employer may lay some claim to the result if
it substantially relates to your work.

Using your employer's equipment to develop or test the code might also
be an indication that it is a work for hire. Either that, or you
misused the company's assets for personal gain. Neither sounds very
attractive.

[Mike Meyer]

bk**@stp.lingfi l.uu.se (Björn Lindström) writes:

Mike Meyer <mw*@mired.or g> writes:

IANAL, but I don't believe the GPL helps in this situation. It places
conditions on redistributing the code; it doesn't force you to
redistribute modifieed code. Your employers could refuse to let you
take the code with you because they own partial copyright on it. They
couldn't sell it later because of the GPL on it, but that's not your
issue here.

If they have the rights to the code, they can sell it, under the GPL or
any license of their choosing. In addition, if you GPL it, your employer
will be able to sell it, just like anyone else.

You're right - the GPL doesn't prevent them from selling it; it just
requires that they make source available to anyone they sell it to,
and prevents them from preventing people who buy it from giving it
away to anyone they want.

<mike
--
Mike Meyer <mw*@mired.or g> http://www.mired.org/home/mwm/
Independent WWW/Perforce/FreeBSD/Unix consultant, email for more information.

[Martin v. Löwis]

mojosam wrote:

How do I decide on a license?

If you want to look at this from a legal point of view,
I highly recommend reading Larry Rosen's book, Open Source
Licensing. It covers issue you would never have thought
of without studying law, and gives good advice (IMHO).

Regards,
Martin

[Tom Anderson]

On Fri, 25 Nov 2005, Robert Kern wrote:

You may also want to read this Licensing HOWTO:

http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/Licensing-HOWTO.html

It's a draft, but it contains useful information.

It's worth mentioning that ESR, who wrote that, is zealously
pro-BSD-style-license. That's not to say that the article isn't useful
and/or balanced, but it's something to bear in mind while reading it.

tom

--
Science runs with us, making us Gods.

[Tom Anderson]

On Fri, 25 Nov 2005, mojosam wrote:

How do I decide on a license?
You decide on what obligations you wish to impose on licensees, then pick
a license which embodies those. There are basically three levels of
obligation:

1. None.

2. Derivatives of the code must be open source.

3. Derivatives of the code and any other code which uses it must be open
source.

By 'derivatives', i mean modified versions. By 'open source', i really
mean 'under the same license as the original code'.

So, the licenses corresponding to these obligations are:

1. A BSD-style license. I say 'BSD-style' because there are about a
hojillion licenses which say more or less the same thing - and it's quite
amazing just how many words can be split spelling out the absence of
obligations - but the grand-daddy of them all is the BSD license:

http://www.opensource.org/licenses/bsd-license.php

2. The GNU Lesser General Public License:

http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/lesser.html

3. The GNU General Public License:

http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/gpl.html

The GPL licenses place quite severe restrictions on the freedom of
programmers using the code, but you often hear GNU people banging on about
freedom - 'free software', 'free as in speech', etc. What you have to
realise is that they're not talking about the freedom of the programmers,
but about the freedom of the software. The logic, i think, is that the
freedom of the code is the key to the freedom of the end-users: applying
the GPL to your code means that other programmers will be forced to apply
to to their code, which means that users of that code will get the
benefits of open source.

Having said all that, you can only license software if you own the
copyright on it, and as has been pointed out, in this case, you might not.
Are there any web sites that summarize the pros and cons?
The GNU project has a quite useful list of licenses, with their takes on
them:

http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html

Bear in mind that the GNU project is strongly in favour of the GPL, so
they're perhaps not as positive about non-GPL licenses as would be fair.

This dude's written about this a bit:

http://zooko.com/license_quick_ref.html
I guess I don't care too much about how other people use it. These
things won't be comprehensive enough or have broad enough appeal that
somebody will slap a new coat of paint on them and try to sell them. I
guess I don't care if somebody incorporates them into something bigger.
If somebody were to add features to them, it would be nice to get the
code and keep the derivative work as open source, but I don't think that
matters all that much to me. If somebody can add value and find a way
of making money at it, I don't think I'd be too upset.
To me, it sounds like you want a BSD-style license. But then i'm a BSD
afficionado myself, so perhaps i would say that!

In fact, while were on the subject, let me plug my own license page:

http://urchin.earth.li/~twic/The_Ama...D_License.html

I apply 0-clause BSD to all the code i release these days.
I will be doing the bulk of the coding on my own time, because I need to
be able to take these tools with me when I change employers. However,
I'm sure that in the course of using these tools, I will need to spend
time on the job debugging or tweaking them. I do not want my current
employer to have any claim on my code in any way. Usually if you
program on company time, that makes what you do a "work for hire". I
can't contaminate my code like that. Does that mean the GPL is the
strongest defense in this situation?
The license you choose has absolutely no bearing on this. Either the
copyright belongs to you, in which case you're fine, or to your employer,
in which case you don't have the right to license it, so its moot.
Let's keep the broader issue of which license will bring about the fall
of Western Civilization
You mean the GPL?
on the other thread.

Oops!

tom

--
Science runs with us, making us Gods.

[Steve Holden]

mojosam wrote:

I've been watching the flame war about licenses with some interest.
There are many motivations for those who participate in this sector, so
disagreements over licenses reflect those agendas.

I don't have an agenda, at least not right now. I do plan on writing a
few programs.

These will be tools I need for firmware testing. They will be
relatively simple things like tools for breaking down data by its
structure for easy viewing, sending commands/macros over serial ports,
etc. Similar things exist, but they don't do everything I need. These
will also be excellent learning opportunities for me, since I'm still
pretty shaky on Python.

How do I decide on a license? Are there any web sites that summarize
the pros and cons? I guess I don't care too much about how other
people use it. These things won't be comprehensive enough or have
broad enough appeal that somebody will slap a new coat of paint on them
and try to sell them. I guess I don't care if somebody incorporates
them into something bigger. If somebody were to add features to them,
it would be nice to get the code and keep the derivative work as open
source, but I don't think that matters all that much to me. If
somebody can add value and find a way of making money at it, I don't
think I'd be too upset.

I will be doing the bulk of the coding on my own time, because I need
to be able to take these tools with me when I change employers.
However, I'm sure that in the course of using these tools, I will need
to spend time on the job debugging or tweaking them. I do not want my
current employer to have any claim on my code in any way. Usually if
you program on company time, that makes what you do a "work for hire".
I can't contaminate my code like that. Does that mean the GPL is the
strongest defense in this situation?

I'm open to suggestions as to which licenses to consider. However,
please try to keep the conversation to the decision process or what
sounds like it is best for this purpose. Let's keep the broader issue
of which license will bring about the fall of Western Civilization on
the other thread.

Openness is your best protection here, as licensing the software can
only impose conditions on those who accept it under the license. It
cannot affect your employer's rights to work you performed while an
employee. Those rights are determined by applicable law.

The only way to ensure that you can take your own unencumbered copy of
code you wrote as an employee is to explain the position fully to your
employer and get their agreement, in writing and in advance, that they
are prepared to have you do so.

Simply assuming that because you have developed the code "in your own
time" you have sole rights to it, or even a right to redistribute, is
likely to lead to trouble and I would recommend against that course of
action.

Apart from that, as others have suggested it looks like a BSD-style
license would suit you best.

regards
Steve
--
Steve Holden [phone] [phone]
Holden Web LLC www.holdenweb.com
PyCon TX 2006 www.python.org/pycon/