Appendix E Open Source Licences
NSA221 User’s Guide
513
tation expressed in the header is covered, as is the documentation, examples, test programs, and all the other material that goes
with the library. A different implementation is free to use the same logical interface, however. Interface issues have been fought
out in court several times; ask a lawyer for details.
Why doesn't the license prohibit the copyright holder from patenting the covered software? No one who distributes their
code under the terms of this license could turn around and sue a user for patent infringement. (Devin Smith)
Boost's lawyers were well aware of patent provisions in licenses like the GPL and
CPL, and would have included such provisions in the Boost license if they were
believed to be legally useful.
Why doesn't the copyright message say "All rights reserved"? Devin Smith says "I don't think it belongs in the copyright
notice for anything (software, electronic documentation, etc.) that is being licensed. It belongs in books that are sold where, in
fact, all rights (e.g., to reproduce the book, etc.) are being reserved in the publisher or author. I think it shouldn't be in the BSD
license."
Do I have to copyright/license trivial files? Even a test file that just contains an empty main() should have a copyright. Files
without copyrights make corporate lawyers nervous, and that's a barrier to adoption. The more of Boost is uniformly copyrighted
and licensed, the less problem people will have with mounting a Boost release CD on a corporate server.
Can I use the Boost license for my own projects outside Boost? Sure; there are no restrictions on the use of the license itself.
Is the Boost license "Open Source"? Yes. The Open Source Initiative certified the Boost Software License 1.0 in early 2008.
T
RANSITION
To ease the transition of the code base towards the new common license, several
people decided to give a blanket permission
for all their contributions to use the
new license. This hopefully helps maintainers to switch to the new license once the
list contains enough names without asking over and over again for each change.
Please consider adding your name to the list.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Dave Abrahams led the Boost effort to develop better licensing. The legal team
was led by Diane Cabell, Director, Clinical Programs, Berkman Center for Internet
& Society, Harvard Law School. Devin Smith, attorney, Nixon Peabody LLP, wrote
the Boost License. Eva Chan, Harvard Law School, contributed analysis of Boost
issues and drafts of various legal documents. Boost members reviewed drafts of
the license. Beman Dawes wrote this web page.
Revised $Date: 2009-06-07 07:14:52 -0400 (Sun, 07 Jun 2009) $
Copyright Beman Dawes, Daniel Frey, David Abrahams, 2003-2004.
Copyright Rene Rivera 2004-2005.
Distributed under the Boost Software License, Version 1.0
.
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