| Author | Lawrence E. Rosen |
|---|---|
| Version | 1.2, 2.1, 3.0 |
| Publisher | Lawrence E. Rosen |
| Published | 2002 |
| DFSG compatible | ? |
| Free software | Yes |
| OSI approved | Yes |
| GPL compatible | See Text |
| Copyleft | No |
| Linking from code with a different license | Yes |
The Academic Free License (AFL) is a permissive free software license written in 2002 by Lawrence E. Rosen, then general counsel of the Open Source Initiative (OSI).
The license grants similar rights to the BSD, MIT, UoI/NCSA and Apache licenses — licenses allowing the software to be made proprietary — but was written to correct perceived problems with those licenses:
- The AFL makes clear what software is being licensed by including a statement following the software's copyright notice;
- The AFL includes a complete copyright grant to the software;
- The AFL contains a complete patent grant to the software;
- The AFL makes clear that no trademark rights are granted to the licensor's trademarks;
- The AFL warrants that the licensor either owns the copyright or is distributing the software under a license;
- The AFL is itself copyrighted, with the right granted to copy and distribute without modification.
AFL versions 1.2 and 2.1 are not compatible with the GNU GPL.[1] The Free Software Foundation has not commented on the newer version 3.0, which Eric S. Raymond (a co-founder of the OSI) contends is GPL compatible. In late 2002, an OSI working draft considered it a "best practice" license.[2] In mid 2006, however, the OSI's License Proliferation Committee found it "redundant with more popular licenses"[3], specifically version 2 of the Apache Software License.
References
- ^ Stallman, Richard. "Various Licenses and Comments about Them". Free Software Foundation. http://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.html. Retrieved July 7, 2007.
- ^ Raymond, Eric (November 9, 2002). "Licensing HOWTO". http://www.catb.org/~esr/Licensing-HOWTO.html. Retrieved July 7, 2007.
- ^ "Report of License Proliferation Committee and draft FAQ". Open Source Initiative. July 31, 2006. http://www.opensource.org/proliferation-report. Retrieved August 17, 2007.
External links
- Text of the Academic Free License v1.2
- Text of the Academic Free License v2.1
- Text of the Academic Free License v3.0
- Allocation of the Risk by Lawrence Rosen (PDF) - reasoning behind the Academic Free License
See also
- License proliferation
- Open Software License - similar, but reciprocal license by the same author
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