Menu
Does it matter? Should I use one or the other? Or both, even? Can the license file be any name? (With any extension?)
I'm sure there's a "best practices" guide that contains all this, but I'm not having any luck finding it.
538
No, you don't have to put the license in each source code file. If you look closer, most FOSS applications don't do that either. They put a copyright statement at the top of each file and a short sentence telling you what license the file is under and where you can find the full text of the license.
A license file (previously called a provisioning file) is a plain text file that automatically supplies required information—such as product name, authorization number, and user contact information—to the Software Authorization Wizard.
License. txt is simply a generic name for any license file. There is no web "standard" or convention for "license. txt" files like there is for, say, robots.
COPYING is standard in the GNU project. I think that either of COPYING or LICENSE would be understood. The FSF has a guide on how to use the GPL, which suggests COPYING, while the Producing Open Source Software book suggests either COPYING or LICENSE. The Apache License recommends a boilerplate that just points to the license online, though the Apache project seems to also include a LICENSE file in their code containing the relevant license or licenses.
It's up to you whether you want to add the .txt suffix; on Windows and Mac OS X it tends to be helpful for default file associations, while on Linux or most other Unix-type operating systems suffixes are optional and it's generally assumed that files are plain text.
116
If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
Donate Us With
