Skip to main content

Those restrictions are probably not legallyenforceable under US copyright law, but they might be in some countries;even asserting them is outrageous. It also purports torestrict commercially running the software and even commercially betory casino bonus givingconsultation about it. There are other points in the license which seem perhapsunacceptable, and in our uncertainty about them we delayed in postingour evaluation.
Being in the public domain is not a license; rather, it means thematerial is not copyrighted and no license is needed. It qualifies as a freesoftware license, but it may not be a real copyleft. This license is based on the terms of the Expatand modified BSD licenses.

  • You can do this, legally, if you are the copyright holder for theprogram.
  • This is a lax, fairly permissive non-copyleft free softwarelicense with practicalproblems like those of the original BSD license, includingincompatibility with the GNU GPL.
  • This is not a free software license; it lacks essential freedoms suchas the right to make and use private changes.
  • However, a furtherlicense change in 2003 made Plan 9 free software.
  • This is a free software license, but incompatible with the GPL,for the same reasons as the Jabber Open SourceLicense.
  • If you are releasing your program under the GNU AGPL, and it caninteract with users over a network, the program should offer its source tothose users in some way.

Repository files navigation

Unfortunately, it has a choice of lawclause which makes it incompatible with the GNU GPL. Depending onwhether Fraunhofer still has active patents covering the work, thesoftware might be a trap now, or not. In terms of GPL compatibility, the Eclipse Public License version2.0 is essentially equivalent to version 1.0.

GPL-Compatible Free Software Licenses

If you are a university student, we recommend you request thedisclaimer at an early stage inwriting the program to reduce resistance. This is a brief explanation of how to place a program under the GNU General Public License, GNU Lesser General Public License, or GNU Affero General Public License. This page is licensed under a CreativeCommons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.

GPL-Incompatible Free Software Licenses

  • These two licenses are frequentlyconfused, as the Open Content License is often referred to as the“OPL”.
  • This license does not qualify as free, because there arerestrictions on distributing modified versions.
  • Despite the name, it is not clear whether this license wouldqualify as “open source”.
  • There is no legal requirement to register your copyright with anyone;simply writing the program makes it copyrighted.
  • If the package says that some fonts inthe package may not be modified, then the package is nonfree.Otherwise the package is free.

Adding that code to the EUPL-covered program providesgrounds to relicense it to the CeCILL v2. To do this two-step relicensing, you need to first write a piece ofcode which you can license under the CeCILL v2, or find asuitable module already available that way, and add it to theprogram. The EUPL allows relicensing to GPLv2, because that is listed as oneof the alternative licenses that users may convert to. The only change is thatit explicitly offers the option of designating the GNU GPL version 2or later as a “secondary license” for a certain piece ofcode.
This is a lax, permissive non-copyleft free software licensewhich is compatible with the GNU GPL. A larger programusually ought to be copyleft; but if you are set on a lax permissivelicense for one, we recommend the Apache 2.0 license since it protectsusers from patent treachery. A larger program usuallyought to be copyleft; but if you are set on using a lax permissivelicense for one, we recommend the Apache 2.0 license since it protectsusers from patent treachery. This is a lax permissive non-copyleft free software license,compatible with the GNU GPL.

Licenses for Works of Practical Use

However, there is no reason to avoid running programs that havebeen released under this license. This is a permissive non-copyleft free software license with a fewrequirements (in sections 4 and 5) that render it incompatible withthe GNU GPL. This is a lax, permissive non-copyleft free software license with anadvertising clause. Previous versions of the SGI Free Software License B were not freesoftware licenses, despite their name. This is a free software license and is compatible with the GNU GPL.Please note, however, that intermediate versions of Python (1.6b1,through 2.0 and 2.1) are under a different license (see below). Practicallyspeaking, though, if a work is in the public domain, it might as wellhave an all-permissive non-copyleft free software license.

The Affero notice

Newer versions Scratch software are distributed under the GNU GPL,but some of those newer version we do not recommend, because theydepend on the proprietary software, Adobe Air. In addition, condition 4 substantivelyrestricts the functionality of modified versions. Thankfully, startingfrom version 5.0.0, the Scilab software is free software, releasedunder CeCILL version 2. It requires publication ofany modified version that an organization uses, even privately.

To do this two-step relicensing, you need to first write a piece of codewhich you can license under the CeCILL v2, or find a suitable modulealready available that way, and add it to the program. The EUPL allows relicensing to GPLv2 only and GPLv3 only, becausethose licenses are listed as two of the alternative licenses that usersmay convert to. However, it givesrecipients ways to relicense the work under the terms of other selectedlicenses, and some of those—the Eclipse Public License inparticular—only provide a weaker copyleft.
This license covers the European Computer Modern Fonts and TextCompanion Fonts, commonly used with LaTeX. However, notethat it does not permit embedding the font in a document unless thatdocument is also licensed under the GPL. As far as we know, an implementation ofa design is always copyrightable.