Project Harmony (FOSS group)
Encyclopedia
Project Harmony is an initiative by Canonical Ltd.
about contributor agreements for Open Source software. The aim of the Harmony project is to develop templates of Contributor License Agreement
s for use by Free and open source software
(FOSS) projects.
The Canonical initiative was announced in June 2010 by Amanda Brock, General Counsel at Canonical. In July 2011, the project released version 1.0 of its agreements templates. Following this release, the project was seen by some as an important step for Intellectual property
and Copyright
management for open Source software, and by some others as "Making an exception (ie copyright aggregation) the norm".
s:
Canonical Ltd.
Canonical Ltd. is a private company founded by South African entrepreneur Mark Shuttleworth to market commercial support and related services for Ubuntu Linux and related projects. Canonical is registered in London and employs staff around the world...
about contributor agreements for Open Source software. The aim of the Harmony project is to develop templates of Contributor License Agreement
Contributor License Agreement
A Contributor License Agreement defines the terms under which intellectual property has been contributed to a company/project, typically software under an open source license.- Rationale :...
s for use by Free and open source software
Free and open source software
Free and open-source software or free/libre/open-source software is software that is liberally licensed to grant users the right to use, study, change, and improve its design through the availability of its source code...
(FOSS) projects.
The Canonical initiative was announced in June 2010 by Amanda Brock, General Counsel at Canonical. In July 2011, the project released version 1.0 of its agreements templates. Following this release, the project was seen by some as an important step for Intellectual property
Intellectual property
Intellectual property is a term referring to a number of distinct types of creations of the mind for which a set of exclusive rights are recognized—and the corresponding fields of law...
and Copyright
Copyright
Copyright is a legal concept, enacted by most governments, giving the creator of an original work exclusive rights to it, usually for a limited time...
management for open Source software, and by some others as "Making an exception (ie copyright aggregation) the norm".
Contributor agreement options
The project proposes two types of options for the Contributor License AgreementContributor License Agreement
A Contributor License Agreement defines the terms under which intellectual property has been contributed to a company/project, typically software under an open source license.- Rationale :...
s:
- Copyright License: Either the contributors retain the copyright to their contribution,
- Copyright Assignment: Or they transfer the copyright of their contribution to the project.
See also
- Free and open source software (FOSS)Free and open source softwareFree and open-source software or free/libre/open-source software is software that is liberally licensed to grant users the right to use, study, change, and improve its design through the availability of its source code...
- Contributor License AgreementContributor License AgreementA Contributor License Agreement defines the terms under which intellectual property has been contributed to a company/project, typically software under an open source license.- Rationale :...