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Third-party content (source code, binary artifacts like libraries, documentation, etc.) is anything that was not submitted directly to Jasig or that is not covered under an ICLA, CCLA, or SGLA. Jasig projects can use third-party content as long as the project is in compliance with the license under which the content is acquired, and as long as use of the third-party content does not violate Jasig's own licensing and policies.

In order to keep Jasig projects available under the terms of the Apache Software License, Jasig follows the guidelines of the Apache Software Foundation regarding inclusion of third-party content in its projects. These guidelines consist of three major categories of third-party licenses that dictate whether and how the third party content can be included.

Category A List

This is the Apache Software Foundation "Category A" list. Third-party content obtained under these licenses may be included directly with Jasig projects.

Jasig Additions:

Many of these licenses have specific attribution terms that need to be adhered to, for example CC-A, often by adding them to the NOTICE file. Ensure you are doing this when including these works.

Category B List

This is the Apache Software Foundation "Category B" list. Third-party content obtained under these licenses may be only be included with Jasig projects in its unmodified binary form. This is because these are "Weak Copyleft" licenses that do not cause Jasig projects to become derivative works unless the third-party content is modified.

There should be an explicit entry in the NOTICE file for any inclusions under these licenses. That entry should name the third-party content that is included, who it is provided by, and the license under which it is provided.

Category X List

This is the Apache Software Foundation "Category X" list. Third-party content obtained under these licenses should not be included in Jasig projects. If it is needed, users should obtain it themselves and combine it with the Jasig project, but Jasig itself should not redistribute content obtained under these licenses.

If a project is compelled to redistribute third-party content obtained under one of the licenses, the inclusion will have to be approved by the Project Steering Committee and by the Jasig Board of Directors. This will limit the conditions under which the Jasig project can be redistributed since it will be considered a derivative work of the content in question, and restrictions will follow from that. It may well not be in the best interests of the project to limit possible adoption on this way.

Other Licenses

Inclusion of third-party content obtained under a license not listed above will have to be approved by the Project Steering Committee and by the Jasig Board of Directors. The groups will need to determine which general Category (A, B, or X) the license falls into, and make its decisions accordingly.

Public Domain

Using content that is in the Public Domain does not require a license. Being in the Public Domain means the material is no longer copyrighted and all the concerns about licensing those copyrights are no longer an issue. Material that is truly in the Public Domain is completely compatible with Jasig projects and can be considered to be in the Category A list.

However, it is important to ensure that the content genuinely is in the Public Domain before consuming it as such. The primary way that content enters into the Public Domain is when the term of the copyright expires – this may take as long as 120 years, depending on the domain and the locale. For a copyright holder to put intellectual property into the Public Domain before the copyright term expires is much harder than it sounds. Many jurisdictions have strong copyright protection laws and make it quite difficult for someone to waive those rights entirely.

For our purposes, it is highly desirable for Public Domain material to be declared as such by the copyright holder through the Creative Commons CC0 process. This provides us with both a thorough declaration of Public Domain status, as well as a very liberal license in case the waiving of copyright is not effective. When seeking to use material that has been poorly dedicated to the Public Domain, please work with the original copyright holders to strengthen this dedication through tools like CC0.

See the Creative Commons Public Domain Tools area for more information about best practices for placing intellectual property into the Public Domain.

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