Licensing
In-depth guides and analysis on licensing from the Safeguard engineering team.
26 articles
The MIT License, Meaning in Plain English
The MIT license meaning, stripped of legalese: do almost anything you want with the code, keep the copyright notice, and the author owes you nothing if it breaks.
Software License Models: A Comparison
Types of software license models split into three broad camps — proprietary, permissive open source, and copyleft — plus the newer source-available middle ground companies keep inventing to protect commercial interests.
What Is a Copyleft License?
Copyleft licenses grant broad rights on one condition: derivative works must stay under the same terms. Here is how strong and weak copyleft differ, and what actually triggers the obligation.
GNU GPL v3.0 Obligations, in Plain English
The GNU General Public License v3.0 explained without the legal phrasing: what you must do when you distribute software that includes GPL-3.0 code, and what triggers those obligations.
Software License Types: The Complete Guide
Permissive, copyleft, proprietary, and public domain: how the main software license types differ, what each one obligates you to do, and how to pick one for your project.
Open Source Licenses Explained: A Practical Primer
Open source licenses explained for engineers who need to make a compliance call today, not read a legal treatise — permissive, copyleft, and what actually changes your obligations.
MIT License vs Apache 2.0: Which to Pick
MIT license vs Apache 2.0 comes down to one real question: do you need an explicit patent grant and contribution terms, or do you want the shortest possible license text?
Types of Licenses: A Quick Reference for Engineers
Software licenses split into permissive, copyleft, and proprietary categories, each with different obligations. Here's a quick reference for the types of license engineers actually run into.
Open Source License Types: A Quick Guide for Engineers
Open source license types split into permissive and copyleft, and knowing which one a dependency uses can matter as much as knowing whether it has a CVE.
The GNU Affero General Public License (AGPL), Explained
The GNU Affero General Public License closes the SaaS loophole in the GPL — if your service runs modified AGPL code over a network, you owe the source, even without distributing a binary.
GitHub Licenses: Choosing One for Your Repo
A practical walkthrough of the license options GitHub surfaces when you create a repo, and how to pick one that matches what you actually want people to do with your code.
GPLv3 License: What Changed From GPLv2
GPLv3 added patent protection and anti-tivoization clauses that GPLv2 never had. Here's what actually changed and why it still matters for dependency compliance.