Licensing

Licensing is a very important procedure that legalizes the usage of different software programs. Licensing refers to the rightful access of a software program. Software are generally licensed and not sold. Accessing a software programme must be accompanied with prior legal permission to do so. This is known as Licensing .

Purpose of Licensing

The main purpose of licensing is to grant rightful permission for access of particular software. In other words, Licensing restricts the usage of software programs. Licensing is a very important tool that protects different software programs from being misused or destroyed. A license prescribes certain rules and principles that a permitted software user is expected to abide by. In case of breach of any such conditions, the authorized user is liable to be sued. This kind of licensing is generally used for software which has vested commercial significance. In Commercial transactions, licensing even refers to the justified distribution of liabilities and tasks between parties involved.

Types of Licensing

Different types of licensing are used some of which refers to the number of machines that one license can run while others refer to the number of users who can make use of a licensed software. Some of the basic categorization of licensing is:

•  Source Code Licensing which can again be categorized into three types are: Permissive, Reciprocal and Reference