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+<meta http-equiv="Content-Language" content="en-us">
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+<meta name="GENERATOR" content="Microsoft FrontPage 5.0">
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+<meta name="ProgId" content="FrontPage.Editor.Document">
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+<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=windows-1252">
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+<title>Boost Software License Background</title>
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+</head>
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+
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+<body bgcolor="#FFFFFF">
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+<table border="1" bgcolor="#007F7F" cellpadding="2">
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+ <tr>
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+ <td bgcolor="#FFFFFF"><img src="../c++boost.gif" alt="c++boost.gif (8819 bytes)" width="277" height="86"></td>
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+ <td><a href="../index.htm"><font face="Arial" color="#FFFFFF"><big>Home</big></font></a></td>
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+ <td><a href="../libs/libraries.htm"><font face="Arial" color="#FFFFFF"><big>Libraries</big></font></a></td>
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+ <td><a href="../people/people.htm"><font face="Arial" color="#FFFFFF"><big>People</big></font></a></td>
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+ <td><a href="faq.htm"><font face="Arial" color="#FFFFFF"><big>FAQ</big></font></a></td>
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+ <td><a href="index.htm"><font face="Arial" color="#FFFFFF"><big>More</big></font></a></td>
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+ </tr>
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+</table>
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+
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+<h1>Information about the <a href="../LICENSE">Boost Software License</a> </h1>
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+
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+<p><a href="../LICENSE">License text</a><br>
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+<a href="#Introduction">Introduction</a><br>
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+<a href="#History">History</a><br>
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+<a href="#Rationale">Rationale</a><br>
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+<a href="#FAQ">FAQ</a><br>
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+<a href="#Acknowledgements">Acknowledgements</a></p>
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+
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+<h2><a name="Introduction">Introduction</a></h2>
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+
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+<p>The <a href="../LICENSE">Boost Software License</a> specifies the terms and
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+conditions of use for the Boost libraries covered by the license.</p>
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+
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+<p>Some Boost libraries have their own licenses. The hope is that eventually all
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+Boost libraries will be covered by the Boost Software License.</p>
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+
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+<h2><a name="History">History</a></h2>
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+
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+<p>As Boost grew, it became unmanageable for each Boost file to have
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+its own license. Users complained that each license needed to be reviewed, and that
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+reviews were difficult or impossible if Boost libraries contained many different licenses.
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+Boost moderators and maintainers spent excessive time dealing with license
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+issues. Boost developers often copied existing licenses without actually knowing
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+if the license wording met legal needs.</p>
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+<p>To clarify these licensing issues, the Boost moderators asked for help from
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+the <a href="http://cyber.law.harvard.edu">Berkman Center for Internet & Society</a>
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+at Harvard Law School, Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. It was requested that a
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+single Boost license be developed that met the traditional requirements that Boost licenses, particularly:</p>
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+<ul>
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+ <li>Must be simple to read and understand. </li>
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+ <li>Must grant permission without fee to copy, use and modify the software for
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+ any use (commercial and non-commercial). </li>
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+ <li>Must require that the license appear with all copies [including
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+ redistributions] of the software source code. </li>
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+ <li>Must not require that the license appear with executables or other binary
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+ uses of the library. </li>
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+ <li>Must not require that the source code be available for execution or other
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+ binary uses of the library. </li>
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+</ul>
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+
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+<p>Additionally, other common open source licenses were studied to see what
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+additional issues were being treated, and additions representing good legal
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+practice were also requested. The result is the <a href="../LICENSE">Boost
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+Software License</a>.</p>
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+
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+<h2><a name="Rationale">Rationale</a></h2>
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+
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+<p>The following rationale was provided by Devin Smith, the
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+lawyer who wrote the Boost Software License. It has been edited slightly for
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+brevity. Editorial additions are shown in square brackets.</p>
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+
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+<h3>Benefit of Common Software License</h3>
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+<p>If one of Boost's goals is to ease use and adoption of the various
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+libraries made available by Boost, it does make sense to try to
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+standardize the licenses under which the libraries are made available to
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+users. (I make some recommendations about a possible short-form license
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+below.)</p>
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+<p>[Standardizing the license will not] necessarily address the issue of satisfying
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+corporate licensees. Each corporation will have its own concerns, based
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+on their own experiences with software licensing and distribution and,
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+if they're careful, will want to carefully review each license, even if
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+they've been told that they're all standard. I would expect that,
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+unless we're remarkably brilliant (or lucky) in drafting the standard
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+Boost license, the standard license won't satisfy the legal departments
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+of all corporations. I imagine that some will, for instance, absolutely
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+insist that licensors provide a warranty of title and provide
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+indemnification for third-party intellectual property infringement
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+claims. Others may want functional warranties. (If I were advising the
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+corporations, I would point out that they're not paying anything for the
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+code and getting such warranties from individual programmers, who
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+probably do not have deep pockets, is not that valuable anyway, but
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+other lawyers may disagree.)</p>
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+<p>But this can be addressed, not by trying to craft the perfect standard
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+license, but by informing the corporations that they can, if they don't like the
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+standard license, approach the authors to negotiate a different, perhaps even
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+paid, license.</p>
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+<p>One other benefit of adopting a standard license is to help ensure that
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+the license accomplishes, from a legal perspective, what the authors
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+intend. For instance, many of the [original] licenses for the libraries available
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+on boost.org do not disclaim the warranty of title, meaning that the
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+authors could, arguably, be sued by a user if the code infringes the
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+rights of a third party and the user is sued by that third party. I
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+think the authors probably want to disclaim this kind of liability.</p>
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+<h3>Short-Form License</h3>
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+<p>Without in anyway detracting from the draft license that's been
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+circulated [to Boost moderators], I'd like to propose an alternative "short-form" license that
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+Boost could have the library authors adopt. David [Abrahams] has expressed a
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+desire to keep things as simple as possible, and to try to move away
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+from past practice as little as possible, and this is my attempt at a
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+draft.</p>
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+<p>This license, which is very similar to the BSD license and the MIT
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+license, should satisfy the Open Source Initiative's Open Source
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+Definition: (i) the license permits free redistribution, (ii) the
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+distributed code includes source code, (iii) the license permits the
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+creation of derivative works, (iv) the license does not discriminate
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+against persons or groups, (v) the license does not discriminate against
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+fields of endeavor, (vi) the rights apply to all to whom the program is
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+redistributed, (vii) the license is not specific to a product, and (viii) the
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+license is technologically neutral (i.e., it does not [require] an explicit gesture of
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+assent in order to establish a contract between licensor and licensee).</p>
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+<p>This license grants all rights under the owner's copyrights (as well as an
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+implied patent license), disclaims all liability for use of the code (including
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+intellectual property infringement liability), and requires that all subsequent
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+copies of the code [except machine-executable object code], including partial copies and derivative works, include the
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+license.</p>
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+
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+<h2><a name="FAQ">FAQ</a></h2>
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+
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+<p><b>Why the phrase "machine-executable object code generated by a source
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+language processor"?</b></p>
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+
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+<p>To distinguish cases where we do not require reproduction of the copyrights
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+and license, such as object libraries, shared libraries, and final program
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+executables, from cases where reproduction is still required, such as
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+distribution of self-extracting archives of source code or precompiled header
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+files. More detailed wording was rejected as not being legally necessary, and
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+reducing readability.</p>
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+
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+<p><b>Why is the "disclaimer" paragraph of the license entirely in uppercase?</b></p>
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+
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+<p>Capitalization of these particular provisions is a US legal mandate for
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+consumer protection. (Diane Cabell)</p>
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+
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+<p><b>Does the copyright and license cover interfaces too?</b></p>
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+
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+<p>The conceptual interface to a library isn't covered. The particular
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+representation expressed in the header is covered, as is the documentation,
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+examples, test programs, and all the other material that goes with the library.
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+A different implementation is free to use the same logical interface, however.
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+Interface issues have been fought out in court several times; ask a lawyer for
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+details.</p>
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+
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+<p><b>Why doesn't the license prohibit the copyright holder from patenting the
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+covered software?</b></p>
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+
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+<p>No one who distributes their code under the terms of this license could turn
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+around and sue a user for patent infringement. (Devin Smith)</p>
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+
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+<p>Boost's lawyers were well aware of patent provisions in licenses like the GPL
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+and CPL, and would have included such provisions in the Boost license if they
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+were believed to be legally useful.</p>
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+
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+<p><b>Since license wording may change over time, why don't source files
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+identify the version number of the license which applies?</b></p>
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+
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+<p>A copy of the current license always accompanies distributions of libraries,
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+and that is legally sufficient. Note that Boost cannot retroactively change the
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+terms applicable to a licensee who has received code under the terms of an older
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+version of a license agreement.</p>
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+
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+<h2><a name="Acknowledgements">Acknowledgements</a></h2>
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+<p>Dave Abrahams led the Boost effort to develop better licensing. The legal
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+team was led by
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+<a href="http://cyber.law.harvard.edu/people/cabell/index.html">Diane Cabell</a>,
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+Director, Clinical Programs, <a href="http://cyber.law.harvard.edu">Berkman
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+Center for Internet & Society</a>, Harvard Law School.
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+<a href="http://www.nixonpeabody.com/attorneys_new_bio.asp?ID=899&Practice_ID=264">
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+Devin Smith</a>, attorney, <a href="http://www.nixonpeabody.com/default.asp">
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+Nixon Peabody LLP</a>, wrote the Boost License. Eva Chen, Harvard Law School,
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+contributed analysis of Boost issues and drafts of various legal documents.
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+Boost members reviewed drafts of the license. Beman Dawes wrote this web page.</p>
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+<hr>
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+<p> © Copyright Beman Dawes 2003.</p>
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+<p> See accompanying <a href="../LICENSE">license</a> for terms and conditions
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+of use.</p>
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+<p>Revised
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+<!--webbot bot="Timestamp" S-Type="EDITED" S-Format="%d %B, %Y" startspan -->18 August, 2003<!--webbot bot="Timestamp" endspan i-checksum="34485" --></p>
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+
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+</body>
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+
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+</html>
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Beman Dawes