Ask HN: What are the differences between the major free software licenses?

2 points

14 years ago

This has been a recurring question. Where can I learn about the differences between commonly used licenses (MIT license, BSD, GNU GPL, and so on) in a clear way?

I've taken a look at the actual statements, and they were not as daunting as I had supposed. However, it is still a little difficult and time-consuming to process the unfamiliar clauses, translating them into normal English and simplifying them into basic points. Do you know of a website or guide that has done this already?

Update: I have found the following chart, but it only gives two items: "Link with code using a different license", and "Release changes under a different license".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_free_software_licenses

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