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9<title>Boost Software License Background</title>
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14<table summary="Navigational header"
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16  <tr>
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24</table>
25
26<h1>Information about the <a href="../LICENSE_1_0.txt">Boost Software License</a> </h1>
27
28<p><a href="../LICENSE_1_0.txt">License text</a><br>
29<a href="#Introduction">Introduction</a><br>
30<a href="#History">History</a><br>
31<a href="#Rationale">Rationale</a><br>
32<a href="#FAQ">FAQ</a><br>
33<a href="#Transition">Transition</a><br>
34<a href="#Acknowledgements">Acknowledgements</a></p>
35
36<h2><a name="Introduction">Introduction</a></h2>
37
38<p>The <a href="../LICENSE_1_0.txt">Boost Software License</a>
39specifies the terms and conditions of use for those Boost libraries
40that it covers.</p>
41
42<p>Currently, some Boost libraries have their own licenses. The hope is that
43eventually all Boost libraries will be covered by the Boost Software
44License.  In the meantime, <b>all</b> libraries comply with the <a
45href="#requirements">Boost License requirements</a>.</p>
46
47<h2><a name="History">History</a></h2>
48
49<p>As Boost grew, it became unmanageable for each Boost file to have
50its own license. Users complained that each license needed to be reviewed, and that
51reviews were difficult or impossible if Boost libraries contained many different licenses.
52Boost moderators and maintainers  spent excessive time dealing with license
53issues. Boost developers often copied existing licenses without actually knowing
54if the license wording met legal needs.</p>
55<p>To clarify these licensing issues, the Boost moderators asked for help from
56the <a href="http://cyber.law.harvard.edu">Berkman Center for Internet &amp; Society</a> 
57at Harvard Law School, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. It was requested that a
58single Boost license be developed that met the traditional requirements that Boost licenses, particularly:</p>
59
60<a name="requirements"></a>
61<ul>
62  <li>Must be simple to read and understand. </li>
63  <li>Must grant permission without fee to copy, use and modify the software for
64  any use (commercial and non-commercial). </li>
65  <li>Must require that the license appear with all copies [including
66  redistributions] of the software source code. </li>
67  <li>Must not require that the license appear with executables or other binary
68  uses of the library. </li>
69  <li>Must not require that the source code be available for execution or other
70  binary uses of the library. </li>
71</ul>
72
73<p>Additionally, other common open source licenses were studied to see what
74additional issues were being treated, and additions representing good legal
75practice were also requested. The result is the <a href="../LICENSE_1_0.txt">Boost
76Software License</a>.</p>
77
78<h2><a name="Rationale">Rationale</a></h2>
79
80<p>The following rationale was provided by Devin Smith, the
81lawyer who wrote the Boost Software License. It has been edited slightly for
82brevity. Editorial additions are shown in square brackets.</p>
83
84<h3>Benefit of Common Software License</h3>
85<p>If one of Boost's goals is to ease use and adoption of the various
86libraries made available by Boost, it does make sense to try to
87standardize the licenses under which the libraries are made available to
88users. (I make some recommendations about a possible short-form license
89below.)</p>
90<p>[Standardizing the license will not] necessarily address the issue of satisfying
91corporate licensees. Each corporation will have its own concerns, based
92on their own experiences with software licensing and distribution and,
93if they're careful, will want to carefully review each license, even if
94they've been told that they're all standard. I would expect that,
95unless we're remarkably brilliant (or lucky) in drafting the standard
96Boost license, the standard license won't satisfy the legal departments
97of all corporations. I imagine that some will, for instance, absolutely
98insist that licensors provide a warranty of title and provide
99indemnification for third-party intellectual property infringement
100claims. Others may want functional warranties. (If I were advising the
101corporations, I would point out that they're not paying anything for the
102code and getting such warranties from individual programmers, who
103probably do not have deep pockets, is not that valuable anyway, but
104other lawyers may disagree.)</p>
105<p>But this can be addressed, not by trying to craft the perfect standard
106license, but by informing the corporations that they can, if they don't like the
107standard license, approach the authors to negotiate a different, perhaps even
108paid, license.</p>
109<p>One other benefit of adopting a standard license is to help ensure that
110the license accomplishes, from a legal perspective, what the authors
111intend. For instance, many of the [original] licenses for the libraries available
112on boost.org do not disclaim the warranty of title, meaning that the
113authors could, arguably, be sued by a user if the code infringes the
114rights of a third party and the user is sued by that third party. I
115think the authors probably want to disclaim this kind of liability.</p>
116<h3>Short-Form License</h3>
117<p>Without in anyway detracting from the draft license that's been
118circulated [to Boost moderators], I'd like to propose an alternative &quot;short-form&quot; license that
119Boost could have the library authors adopt. David [Abrahams] has expressed a
120desire to keep things as simple as possible, and to try to move away
121from past practice as little as possible, and this is my attempt at a
122draft.</p>
123<p>This license, which is very similar to the BSD license and the MIT
124license, should satisfy the Open Source Initiative's Open Source
125Definition: (i) the license permits free redistribution, (ii) the
126distributed code includes source code, (iii) the license permits the
127creation of derivative works, (iv) the license does not discriminate
128against persons or groups, (v) the license does not discriminate against
129fields of endeavor, (vi) the rights apply to all to whom the program is
130redistributed, (vii) the license is not specific to a product, and (viii) the
131license is technologically neutral (i.e., it does not [require] an explicit gesture of
132assent in order to establish a contract between licensor and licensee).</p>
133<p>This license grants all rights under the owner's copyrights (as well as an
134implied patent license), disclaims all liability for use of the code (including
135intellectual property infringement liability), and requires that all subsequent
136copies of the code [except machine-executable object code], including partial copies and derivative works, include the
137license.</p>
138
139<h2><a name="FAQ">FAQ</a></h2>
140
141<p><b>How should Boost programmers apply the license to source and
142header files?</b></p>
143
144<p>Add a comment based on the following template, substituting
145appropriate text for the italicized portion:
146<br>
147<br>
148<pre>
149//          Copyright <i>Joe Coder 2004 - 2006</i>.
150// Distributed under the Boost Software License, Version 1.0.
151//    (See accompanying file LICENSE_1_0.txt or copy at
152//          http://www.boost.org/LICENSE_1_0.txt)
153</pre>
154<br>
155Please leave an empty line before and after the above comment block.
156It is fine if the copyright and license messages are not on different lines; in
157no case there should be other intervening text. Do not include
158"All rights reserved" anywhere.<br>
159
160<p>Other ways of licensing source files have been considered, but some
161of them turned out to unintentionally nullify legal elements of the
162license.  Having fixed language for referring to the license helps
163corporate legal departments evaluate the boost distribution.
164Creativity in license reference language is strongly discouraged, but
165judicious changes in the use of whitespace are fine.
166
167<p><b>How should the license be applied to documentation files, instead?</b></p>
168
169<p>Very similarly to the way it is applied to source files: the user should
170see the very same text indicated in the template above, with the only difference
171that both the local and the web copy of LICENSE_1_0.txt should be linked to.
172Refer to the HTML source code of this page in case of doubt.
173
174<p>Note that the location of the local LICENSE_1_0.txt needs to be indicated
175relatively to the position of your documentation file
176(<code>../LICENSE_1_0.txt</code>, <code>../../LICENSE_1_0.txt</code> etc.)</p>
177
178<p><b>How is the Boost license different from the
179<a href="http://www.opensource.org/licenses/gpl-license.php">GNU General Public
180License (GPL)</a>?</b></p>
181
182
183<p>The Boost license permits the creation of derivative works for
184commercial or non-commercial use with no legal requirement to release
185your source code. Other differences include Boost not requiring
186reproduction of copyright messages for object code redistribution, and
187the fact that the Boost license is not &quot;viral&quot;: if you
188distribute your own code along with some Boost code, the Boost license
189applies only to the Boost code (and modified versions thereof); you
190are free to license your own code under any terms you like. The GPL is
191also much longer, and thus may be harder to understand.</p>
192
193<p><b>Why the phrase &quot;machine-executable object code generated by a source
194language processor&quot;?</b></p>
195
196<p>To distinguish cases where we do not require reproduction of the copyrights
197and license, such as object libraries, shared libraries, and final program
198executables, from cases where reproduction is still required, such as
199distribution of self-extracting archives of source code or precompiled header
200files. More detailed wording was rejected as not being legally necessary, and
201reducing readability.</p>
202
203<p><b>Why is the &quot;disclaimer&quot; paragraph of the license entirely in uppercase?</b></p>
204
205<p>Capitalization of these particular provisions is a US legal mandate for
206consumer protection. (Diane Cabell)</p>
207
208<p><b>Does the copyright and license cover interfaces too?</b></p>
209
210<p>The conceptual interface to a library isn't covered. The particular
211representation expressed in the header is covered, as is the documentation,
212examples, test programs, and all the other material that goes with the library.
213A different implementation is free to use the same logical interface, however.
214Interface issues have been fought out in court several times; ask a lawyer for
215details.</p>
216
217<p><b>Why doesn't the license prohibit the copyright holder from patenting the
218covered software?</b></p>
219
220<p>No one who distributes their code under the terms of this license could turn
221around and sue a user for patent infringement. (Devin Smith)</p>
222
223<p>Boost's lawyers were well aware of patent provisions in licenses like the GPL
224and CPL, and would have included such provisions in the Boost license if they
225were believed to be legally useful.</p>
226
227<p><b>Why doesn't the copyright message say &quot;All rights reserved&quot;?</b></p>
228
229<p>Devin Smith says &quot;I don't think it belongs in the copyright notice for
230anything (software, electronic documentation, etc.) that is being licensed. It
231belongs in books that are sold where, in fact, all rights (e.g., to reproduce
232the book, etc.) are being reserved in the publisher or author. I think it
233shouldn't be in the BSD license.&quot;</p>
234
235<p><b>Do I have to copyright/license trivial files?</b> 
236
237<p>Even a test file that just contains an empty <code>main()</code>
238should have a copyright.  Files without copyrights make corporate
239lawyers nervous, and that's a barrier to adoption.  The more of Boost
240is uniformly copyrighted and licensed, the less problem people will
241have with mounting a Boost release CD on a corporate server.
242
243
244<p><b>Can I use the Boost license for my own projects outside Boost?</b> 
245
246<p>Sure; there are no restrictions on the use of the license itself.
247
248<h2><a name="Transition">Transition</a></h2>
249
250<p>To ease the transition of the code base towards the new common
251license, several people decided to give a <a
252href="blanket-permission.txt">blanket permission</a> for all
253their contributions to use the new license. This hopefully helps
254maintainers to switch to the new license once the list contains enough
255names without asking over and over again for each change. Please
256consider adding your name to the list.</p> 
257
258<h2><a name="Acknowledgements">Acknowledgements</a></h2>
259<p>Dave Abrahams led the Boost effort to develop better licensing. The legal
260team was led by
261<a href="http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/cabell/index.html">Diane Cabell</a>,
262Director, Clinical Programs, <a href="http://cyber.law.harvard.edu">Berkman
263Center for Internet &amp; Society</a>, Harvard Law School.
264<a href="http://www.nixonpeabody.com/attorneys_detail1.asp?ID=121">Devin Smith</a>, attorney, <a href="http://www.nixonpeabody.com/default.asp">
265Nixon Peabody LLP</a>, wrote the Boost License. Eva Chan, Harvard Law School,
266contributed analysis of Boost issues and drafts of various legal documents.
267Boost members reviewed drafts of the license. Beman Dawes wrote this web page.</p>
268<hr>
269<p>Revised
270<!--webbot bot="Timestamp" S-Type="EDITED" S-Format="%d %B, %Y" startspan -->27 August, 2004<!--webbot bot="Timestamp" endspan i-checksum="39365" --></p>
271
272<p> &copy; Copyright 2003-2004 Beman Dawes, Daniel Frey, David Abrahams.</p>
273<p> Distributed under the Boost Software License, Version 1.0.
274(See accompanying file <a href="../LICENSE_1_0.txt">LICENSE_1_0.txt</a> or
275copy at <a href="http://www.boost.org/LICENSE_1_0.txt">www.boost.org/LICENSE_1_0.txt</a>)
276</p>
277
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