Open Source Licenses For Academic Work? 173
An anonymous reader writes "We're in the process of submitting a scientific paper describing some techniques for data analysis. We'll be releasing the associated code, so we're faced with choosing an appropriate license. My supervisor insists there should be a citation clause, requiring any published article that uses results of the software to cite our paper. Of course, ideally, free software shouldn't have such encumbrances, and I initially tried to talk him out of it. However, in academia, the issue of attribution and citation is very important. Also, it is not a restriction on use of the software per se, only on publication of results. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any such license. So I wondered: what do other academic Slashdotters do?"
Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic (Score:2, Interesting)
The Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license looks
like what you need
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/
It allows others to modify and adapt your work as long
as they attribute the original in the manner specified by you.
Use the oldest and best License (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Enforcing the license? (Score:4, Interesting)
or Boo Hoo, what if someone read your paper and then did not cite it in their derivative work?
Citations are a matter of academic integrity and publishing ethics not law.
The B is BSD is for some university called Berkley (Score:3, Interesting)
The important thing to have cited is your results in your paper, not your software. Many academic institutions have been writing open source software for a long time, in fact many of the open source licensees that are used every day come from software that was developed in academic institutions. Things like MIT license, much of the motivation behind the GNU license, BSD, the list goes on. None of them require attribution.
Re:Enforcing the license? (Score:5, Interesting)
This was exactly my thought, we GPL all the software out of our lab. We also have a prominent notice on our download page giving the proper journal citation for this particular piece of software, so users know what to put.
However to not cite software used, particularly when the exact citation line is given to you so easily, in academic would be considered academic dishonesty. Sloppy as you said. And would reflect very poorly on the author of the paper if it were ever to come to light.
Since you can't really enforce it without a costly lawsuit, you simply have to have faith other academics will follow the same attribution code to cite sources, including software.
What might be more useful is writing this to a prominent journal in your field as a letter to bring attention to this issue, to help teach those older academics who never thought about the issues of citing software.
Re:Enforcing the license? (Score:5, Interesting)
use the GPL (Score:3, Interesting)
the GPL does have a detailed description of the attribution issue in their preamble. Asking for attribution on GPLed work as a condition of use is perfectly compatible with the GPL license.
(The above refers to GPL v.2)
--Sam
Use a well-known license (Score:4, Interesting)
Two points to keep in mind:
You may be able to convince your supervisor by citing the examples of BSD Unix and X11, which brought fame and money to their creators (the CSG at Berkeley, and project Athena at MIT) while using extremely liberal licenses -- the MIT/X11 license (which is what I use for my research) and the 4-clause BSD license, albeit with the advertising clause not being enforced.
You may also want to cite the following anegdote. Two years ago, I was compiling a Linux LiveCD [jussieu.fr] for our first, second and third year undergrads. One of the pieces of software I wanted to include was a Prolog compiler from a well-known Portuguese university which we use in third-year courses.
Unfortunately, the Prolog implementation was covered by a fairly strict license that would significantly complicate our distribution process. After a few exchanges of e-mail with the copyright holders, they told us that we were welcome to do whatever we wanted, but they'd not change the license for us.
After consulting with our legal department, we decided we could not include the Prolog compiler.
Read the FAQ! (Score:2, Interesting)
This is a FAQ about free software licences, see http://people.debian.org/~bap/dfsg-faq.html [debian.org] question 12.g.
Have the software make recommendations (Score:1, Interesting)
In my science software, I've written it to keep track of the methods used in the software. When a user is done using it, the software tells her or him (via display to terminal and output to a log) which methods have been used and the appropriate citations for each (I am often not an author on the appropriate citation) as well as the appropriate citation for the software itself. It makes it easier for users to do the right thing (especially in regards to citation of methods, which are often under-cited) without requiring users to agree to a use license. The software itself is GPL'ed.
Hardcode Attribution into the Output (Score:2, Interesting)
Also, enter a comment section in the program code that makes the same request.
Then code into the program a section that prints as a head/footer in the formatted output or as every Nth line in the unformatted output file text such as "Data created by Program X developed by Person Y at Place Z".
You'll have your attribution, and likely only those who weren't going to comply anyway will bother to edit the output or program code to remove it.
QED
I'd Check With Your Legal Dept. First (Score:4, Interesting)
It could very well be (probably be?) that the license you have to publish under is already set and that you are legally bound to follow it.
Depending on who funded the research, there could be other restrictions and obligations as well.
Certain funding institutions require there be no copyright at all, while others may have some agreement in place that you might violate if you don't investigate this first.
Stuff like this is how you can lose funding - not just for yourself, but for the institution. And the legal issues, under the wrong circumstances, could end up haunting you.
What about (Score:1, Interesting)
using any old EULA, but putting restrictions on the download that say they agree to cite the software were appropriate.
It only affects it if the academic downloaded the software directly from you, but its not like the citation clause is practically enforcable, and what you really want is to keep your boss happy.
It also avoids the issue of a clause which persists long after the original purpose expires, since if the software is forked, the new developers may need to cite the original, but users of the new software will not.
Make it easy for your users. (Score:2, Interesting)
As several people have said earlier, it would be sloppy not to include a citation to any software you use when you write a scientific text. I've more often experienced the opposite problem; trying to find an article to cite for a piece of software I've needed to use. At times you cannot find such articles and hence you are forced to refer to some web page inststead. Which of course will be down the exact day the referee reads your article. I've never met anyone who are reluctant to cite the software they use. After all, a scientific article on the software frees them from the responsibility of describing every piece of it themselves.
So, to the licensing issue; I'd strongly recommend sticking to one of the standard licenses. It really helps the people who want to use your code (and hence will cite your articles). For every new license your users must consider, they will be forced to decide wether or not they can use your code together with other stuff they need. If they want their program released as free software, and particularly if they want it included in e.g. Debian they will probably steer away from unusual or non-DFSG-compliant licenses. Your supervisor wants them to use your software (even though he might not know that) because usage generates citations.
Trust your users, they will cite you. (And give them the BibTeX entry to your article to make it easier for them.)