Open Software License

The Open Software License (OSL ) is a software license that was developed by Lawrence Rosen. The Open Source Initiative ( OSI) has certified the license as valid open source license, but version 1.1 was later declared by the Debian project as incompatible with the DFSG. The OSL is a copyleft license with a termination clause, which comes into force in the event of a patent dispute.

Many contributors to the free and open - source movement are of the opinion that patents of software harm, and are particularly harmful to open source software. The OSL trying to counteract this by a collection of programs is created, the user can use, provided that the user does not try to harm the by a court process is sought for patent infringement.

  • 3.1 Restriction of the license
  • 3.2 dissemination
  • 3.3 Termination clause in patent litigation

Author

Lawrence Rosen created the Open Software License, which was arranged by the Open Source Initiative as an open- source license.

Key Features

Termination clause in litigation for patent infringement

The OSL has a termination clause that will prevent users from seeking processes for patent infringement:

" 10) Termination for Patent Action. This License Shall terminate Automatically and methods You may no longer exercise any of the rights granted to You by this License as of the date You commence to action, including a cross -claim or counterclaim, against Licensor or any licensee alleging did the Original Work infringes a patent. This termination commission Shall not apply for patent infringement of action alleging by Combinations of the Original Work with other software or hardware. "

Respecting the origin

Another object of the OSL is to preserve their origin.

" 7 ) Warranty of Provenance and Disclaimer of Warranty. Licensor warrants did the copyright in and to the Original Work and the patent rights granted by Licensor are owned in by the Licensor or are sublicensed to You under the terms of this License with the permission of the contributor ( s ) Of Those copyrights and patent rights. "

Comparison with LGPL / GPL

The OSL is intentionally similar to the LGPL. Note should be one that the definition of the Derived works in the OSL the left to OSL software or libraries not including why software that OSL is linking software, not part of the OSL license.

The OSL is incompatible with the GPL. It is claimed that the OSL intending to be legally stronger than the GPL, however, was the OSL, unlike the GPL, never tested in court and is not very widespread.

Restricting license

The restriction in section 9 of the license is:

"If You distribute or communicate copies of the Original Work or a Derivative Work, You must make a reasonable effort under the Circumstances to Obtain the express assent of recipients to the terms of this License. "

In the analysis of OS license the Free Software says Foundation that "this restriction means that a proliferation of OSL software on regular FTP sites, sending in patches to regular mailing lists, or storing the software in a version control system a violation of the may be guidelines of the license and therefore may suspend the offender to a possible termination of the license. therefore it makes the OSL difficult to develop software with the frequently used tools to develop free software. "

Dissemination

Provided that the assertion of the FSF turns out to be true, the main difference between the GPL and the OSL concerns the potential limitations of proliferation. Both licenses impose relative reciprocity, which imposed creators of extensions to the software under the license to publish this under the same license as the original work.

Termination clause in patent litigation

The termination clause due to patent infringement, which was described above, is another significant difference between the OSL and GPL.

Further provisions

  • Derivative works must be distributed under the same license. ( § 1c)
  • The widespread use of the license works must be accompanied by the source code or need access to the source code allows otherwise (§ 3)
  • With regard to the calculation of costs for programs under the license there are no restrictions, but the source code must be accompanied at a reasonable cost or made ​​available are (§ 3)
  • Under the license works, which must be distributed, a verbatim copy of the license attribute (§ 16)
  • The distribution sets (but nowhere mentioned explicitly ) a royalty-free license to all patents that contains the software requires (§ 2)

Later versions

It is optional, but common that the copyright owner the dissemination provisions of the license " or any later version " adds to regulate the distribution under future versions of the license. This term is not mentioned directly in the OSL. However, this would not be in accordance with section 16, which requires a verbatim copy of the license.

Open software, which is under the OSL

  • Clear Canvas, enterprise-ready DICOM Viewer and RIS / PACS.
  • NUnitLite, a lightweight version of NUnit
  • Magento, an eCommerce web application
  • PrestaShop, an eCommerce web application
  • Mulgara, one written in Java triplestore.
  • Sparse, a tool for analyzing static code developed for the Linux kernel.
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