Steve M. Robbins <steven.robbins@videotron.ca> wrote:

I've a question for the drafters of the Boost Software License - Version 1.0 - August 17th, 2003.

I am not one of them, but I can give you some answers anyway.

Put yourself in the position of someone who wants to redistribute a modified version of Boost. For example, the linux distributors like Debian.

The license begins with the permission grant:

Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person or organization obtaining a copy of the software and accompanying documentation covered by this license (the "Software") to use, reproduce, display, distribute, execute, and transmit the Software, and to prepare derivative works of the Software, and to permit third-parties to whom the Software is furnished to do so, all subject to the following:

[... a restriction and a disclaimer paragraph ...]

As I read this, "the Software" means "the unmodified tar or zip file obtained from boost.org". Is that correct?

No, it means whatever software says the licence applies to it. This licence does not (yet) apply to all of Boost. All parts of it are supposed to come with a licence that meets certain requirements, listed at <http://www.boost.org/more/lib_guide.htm#License>. The licence you are reading is supposed to be a standard licence that meets these requirements. There is a fuller explanation at <http://www.boost-consulting.com/boost/more/license_info.html>.

I'm permitted to "prepare derivative works of the Software", but the license doesn't specify what I may do with my derivative works.

Clearly, I may distribute "the Software", but may I distribute the derivative work?

I think that may be legally implicit, but I am not a lawyer.

Some licenses (e.g. the BSD and the GPL) make it clear that the terms apply to both the software and to derivative works. Shouldn't the boost license do likewise?

Even if it is legally implicit, I can see that it would be a good idea to clarify it. Since it doesn't specify have a choice-of-law clause it could be interpreted according to any country's contract law and things that are implicit according to US law might not be so elsewhere. Ben.