Copyright, Licencing for 3rd party tool

[Former Member]

My partner and I are developing a commercial add-on on an SDN Subscription license, we have our own name space etc...but we would like to have a copyright in the code. Is there some standard text that other entrepreneur-developers are using?

Licensing contracts are another area where we could use some help. Are there some good boilerplate documents we could leverage that are specific to the SAP space?

Thanks in advance.

[MaiAnh]

Hi Carl,

FYI, the SDN subscription license is strictly for personal training and it doesn't allow for commercializing any build add-on component with this license.

SAP provides the Application Development license which you can commercialize the add-on. If you are interested, please apply at http://www.sap.com/community/survey/index.epx?SurveyID=1089

Best regards,

MaiAnh

[matt]

>

> Hi Carl,
> 
> FYI, the SDN subscription license is strictly for personal training and it doesn't allow for commercializing any build add-on component with this license.
> 
> SAP provides the Application Development license which you can commercialize the add-on. If you are interested, please apply at http://www.sap.com/community/survey/index.epx?SurveyID=1089
> 
> Best regards,
> MaiAnh

Mai Anh

How does that tally with:

https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/scn/subscriptions/development

It allows developers and consultants to ...Commercialize add-ons

And this: https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/scn/subscriptions/development?rid=/webcontent/uuid/201dc656-e003-2b10-2d... [original link is broken]

And if you follow either route - learning, or developing - you end up here: https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/go/portal/prtroot/docs/webcontent/uuid/30a87ab2-170d-2b10-7a8b-d46d1... [original link is broken] I understand you are a SAP employee, but I would like to know in what capacity you are posting? My reading is that there is ONE subscription license - $1,170.00 for US residents.

The Netweaver download from this site is strictly for personal use. But I'm totally certain that the subscription includes the right to develop commercial applications. Otherwise what would be the point of being able to register your own namespace?!

Matt.

[Former Member]

Thanks for the heads up, This is important info.

To your point above Mai Anh

I was not aware of the limitation in the license. Now that I have read the licence (https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/scn/subscriptions/development?rid=/webcontent/uuid/d07ab93b-1d0e-2b10-ed9e-8d35d34a2fed [original link is broken]) it seems like commercialization of certain types of add-ons are covered in the license, specifically "Productive Use, Commercialization of Add-Ons that Do Not Consume Enterprise Services" is permitted.

Can anyone point me to a plain English explanation of the difference between Add-Ons that Do Not Consume Enterprise Services, and Add-Ons that Do Consume Enterprise Services?

I tried to follow the link (http://esworkplace.sap.com/index.html) in the license under 1.5 the definition of u201CEnterprise Service Definitionu201D which is referred to by 1.4 the definition of u201CEnterprise Serviceu201D but I got

"Our service is not available at the moment(BUX). Please try again later.

We apologize for the trouble caused."

I'm not sure if this is temporary or not.

So I am not sure if my question is answered. If we can use the subscription license then my original question still stands. If we need an additional license, then my understanding is that SAP does support the licensing and copyright issues inside of that other licensing framework, and my question is partially answered. I'm still not sure exactly where to go to get the licensing boilerplate and code copyright verbage even in the second place. So I will leave this unanswered for now.

Edited by: Carl Shepherd on Apr 22, 2009 8:57 PM

[MaiAnh]

Hi Carl,

I like to clarify that the SDN subscription allows for commercialization of the add-ons by an individual (= person) and not by an entity (= company). So as long as the add-on is commercialized by an individual consultant then the SDN subscription is sufficient.

If the IP for the add-on to be held by a "company", then you need to apply to a company-level license at http://www.sap.com/community/survey/index.epx?SurveyID=1089.

In a nutshell, Enterprise Services (ES) are highly-integrated Web services with business logic and semantics that can be accessed and used repeately to support a particualr business process. You can browse the ES in the ES workplace: https://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/esworkplace

The add-on that consumes these existing ES by calling them as part of your add-on. Your developer would know if there are such ES interfaces in the add-on. You can drop me an email if you have any doubt.

I hope it clarifies.

Best regards,

MaiAnh