Jaslabs: High performance Software

By Justin Silverton

The following is an excerpt from the BSD license:

Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions are met:

• Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
• Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
• Neither the name of the nor the names of its contributors may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software without specific prior written permission.

THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE COPYRIGHT HOLDERS AND CONTRIBUTORS “AS IS” AND ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE COPYRIGHT OWNER OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGE.

Reasons why it is better for business

Open source, in general (no matter what license is used) can help a non-software based company.  This is for the following reasons:

• Low cost of ownership.  For the most part, open source is free of charge and has little to no licensing fees.
• Total source control.  This prevents vendor lock-in from proprietary applications.

A software-based business falls under a different category.  Utilizing open source can tremendously, but only if a proper license is used.  The BSD license is a great license because it allows the following:

• ability to mix code with almost any other license type.  Unlike many of the other open source licenses, there is no requirements when mixing with other license types.  This allows for a greater degree of freedom.
• code is not required to be open source.  As long as you include a copy of the license with all copyright information, you are allowed to release code under the BSD license.