Comparison of open source licenses

Artistic license

For distribution of forks, clearly document changes and (a) send upstream, (b) name differently and play nice with original, or (c) license it under a license that fulfills certain criteria. You must not charge licensing fees for packages that include the work. When the original work’s API/interface is not exposed, your derived work is not restricted by any other terms. The same applies if you distribute bugfixes or portability fixes.

GPL/LGPL

Entries specific to version 3 (“v3” suffix) mean that the answer for version 2 is no.

General remarks

Accuracy: I do not guarantee that the information in this table is correct, even though I made every effort to check it. Some details are omitted, so you shouldn’t exclusively rely on this table, anyway.

License: This document is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License.

URLs: HTML version at http://j.mp/opensource-licenses, link to PDF version at http://jan-krueger.net/opensource-licenses

1

forks must relicense under the same terms

2

for contributions to upstream

3

LGPL: not for things that just interface with the work

4

people may opt to apply a newer version of the license if granted by the author

5

unless otherwise noted, nominal transfer fees are always allowed

6

except unmodified; see details section

7

and always include NOTICE file

8

except bugfixes, portability etc.; see detailed section

9

disclaimer allows for local laws that restrict completely disclaiming liability

This document was translated from L^AT_EX by H^EV^EA.