Sun Industry Standards Source License
| Company type | Software license |
|---|---|
| Industry | Free and open-source software |
| Founder | Sun Microsystems |
| Fate | Discontinued |
Key people | Simon Phipps (Chief Open Source Officer) |
| Products | Software licensing |
| Owner | Sun Microsystems |
The Sun Industry Standards Source License (SISSL) was a discontinued free software and open source license, officially acknowledged by both the Free Software Foundation and the Open Source Initiative (OSI). This license permitted developers to freely alter and distribute source code and executable files, offering the flexibility to keep their changes either private or public. A distinctive aspect of SISSL was its requirement that any modifications adhere to the standards established by the appropriate Standards organization at least 120 days prior to distribution. If changes failed to meet these standards, a copyleft provision was triggered, obligating the source code to be released under SISSL within 30 days without any royalty fees.
Among the prominent initiatives supported by Sun Microsystems under the SISSL framework were OpenOffice.org and Sun Grid Engine (SGE). Subsequent versions of OpenOffice.org utilized a dual-licensing approach with SISSL and LGPL until SISSL was phased out, after which OpenOffice.org adopted LGPL exclusively. In contrast, Sun Grid Engine continues to be governed by the SISSL terms.
The retirement of SISSL was declared by Sun’s Chief Open Source Officer, Simon Phipps, on September 2, 2005, as part of an effort to curtail the proliferation of software licenses. The OSI currently categorizes SISSL as "voluntarily retired" by Sun, which no longer endorses its application. For instance, the code for OpenOffice.org version 2.0 is licensed solely under LGPL. Following this development, Sun introduced the Common Development and Distribution License, derived from the Mozilla Public License, under which it released projects such as OpenSolaris and the GlassFish Application Server.
External links
- Sun Industry Standards Source License - Version 1.1 (OpenOffice.org)
- Sun Industry Standards Source License - Version 1.2 (Sun Grid Engine)
- OpenOffice.org license change