Isc License

ISC license
Publisher	Internet Systems Consortium
DFSG compatible	Yes
FSF approved	Yes
OSI approved	Yes
GPL compatible	Yes
Copyleft	No
Linking from code with a different license	Yes
Website	{{{1}}}

Short description: Permissive free software license published by the Internet Software Consortium

The ISC license is a permissive free software license published by the Internet Software Consortium, now called Internet Systems Consortium (ISC). It is functionally equivalent to the simplified BSD and MIT licenses, but without language deemed unnecessary following the Berne Convention.^{[nb 1]}^{[nb 2]}

Originally used for ISC software such as BIND and dig, it has become the preferred license for contributions to OpenBSD^[6] and the default license for npm packages.^[7] The ISC license is also used for Linux wireless drivers contributed by Qualcomm Atheros.^[8]

License terms

ISC License

Copyright <YEAR> <OWNER>

Permission to use, copy, modify, and/or distribute this software for any purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies.

THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE AUTHOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.

When initially released, the license did not include the term "and/or", which was changed from "and" by ISC in 2007.^[9] Paul Vixie stated on the BIND mailing list that the ISC license started using the term "and/or" to avoid controversy similar to the events surrounding the University of Washington's refusal to allow distribution of the Pine email software.^[9] Both versions of the license are compatible with the GNU GPL.^[2]

OpenBSD license

The OpenBSD project began using the ISC license in 2003, before ISC added the term "and/or".^[10]

{{{1}}}

Theo de Raadt of OpenBSD chose to retain the original wording, stating that he "disagrees with what ISC did" and is "not confident that their change is good".^[5]

Reception

In 2015, ISC announced they would release their Kea DHCP Software under the Mozilla Public License 2.0, stating, "There is no longer a good reason for ISC to have its own license, separate from everything else".^[11] They also preferred a copyleft license, stating, "If a company uses our software but improves it, we really want those improvements to go back into the master source". Throughout the following years, they re-licensed all ISC-hosted software, including BIND in 2016^[12] and ISC DHCP Server in 2017.^[13]

The Publications Office of the European Union advises using the MIT license instead of the ISC License in order to reduce license proliferation.^[14]

The GNU project states the inclusion of "and/or" still allows the license to be interpreted as prohibiting distribution of modified versions. Although they state there is no reason to avoid software released under this license, they advise against using the license to keep the problematic language from causing trouble in the future.^[15]

Footnotes

↑ "The ISC copyright is functionally equivalent to a two-term BSD copyright with language removed that is made unnecessary by the Berne convention."^[4]
↑ "In OpenBSD we use an ISC-style copyright text [...] that is enough to satisfy every legal system on the planet which follows the Berne Convention."^[5]

References

↑
"License information". Software in the Public Interest. 1997–2017. https://www.debian.org/legal/licenses/. "... This page presents the opinion of some debian-legal contributors on how certain licenses follow the Debian Free Software Guidelines (DFSG). ... Licenses currently found in Debian main include:
- ...
- Expat/MIT-style licenses
- ...
"
↑ ^2.0 ^2.1 ^2.2 ^2.3 "Various Licenses and Comments about Them". Free Software Foundation. 2014–2017. ISC License. https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html. "... This is a lax, permissive free software license, and compatible with the GNU GPL. ... This license is sometimes also known as the OpenBSD License, although there is one minor difference between the two licenses. The OpenBSD license was updated to remove the ambiguous term: "and/or". ... At the time the ISC license was released, the use of "and/or" construct was a concern because it is similar language used in the license of Pine that the University of Washington later claimed prohibited people from distributing modified versions of the software. ..."
↑
"Licenses by Name". n.d.. https://opensource.org/licenses/alphabetical. "... The following licenses have been approved by the OSI. ...
- ...
- ISC License (ISC)
- ...
"
↑ "Copyright Policy". OpenBSD. http://www.openbsd.org/policy.html.
↑ ^5.0 ^5.1 de Raadt, Theo (21 March 2008). "Re: BSD Documentation License?". openbsd-misc (Mailing list). Retrieved 17 March 2017.
↑ "OpenBSD license template". http://cvsweb.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/share/misc/license.template?rev=HEAD.
↑ Oxley, Tim (8 January 2014). "Update default license to ISC". npm/init-package-json. Pull Request #9. https://github.com/npm/init-package-json/pull/9.
↑ "en/users/Drivers/Atheros - Linux Wireless". http://linuxwireless.org/en/users/Drivers/Atheros/.
↑ ^9.0 ^9.1 Vixie, Paul (20 July 2007). "BIND covered under which license and does it conatin any cryptographic content ?". Newsgroup: comp.protocols.dns.bind. Retrieved 2017-07-15 – via Google Groups.
↑ "src/share/misc/license.template - view - 1.1". 2003-06-03. https://cvsweb.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/share/misc/license.template?rev=1.1&content-type=text/x-cvsweb-markup.
↑ "Kea to be released under Mozilla Public License 2.0 - Internet Systems Consortium". 8 December 2015. https://www.isc.org/blogs/kea-license-2-0/.
↑ "BIND 9 Adopts the MPL 2.0 License with BIND 9.11.0 - Internet Systems Consortium". 27 June 2016. https://www.isc.org/blogs/bind9-adopts-the-mpl-2-0-license-with-bind-9-11-0/.
↑ "ISC DHCP Moves to MPL 2.0 License - Internet Systems Consortium". 19 June 2017. https://www.isc.org/blogs/isc-dhcp-moves-to-mpl-2-0-license/.
↑ "ISC License (ISC) - EU Vocabularies - Publications Office of the EU". https://op.europa.eu/en/web/eu-vocabularies/concept/-/resource?uri=http://publications.europa.eu/resource/authority/licence/ISC.
↑ "Various Licenses and Comments about Them" (in en). https://www.gnu.org/licenses/license-list.en.html#ISC.