[License-discuss] Using opensource in a company not in the software business

[FREJAVILLE Etienne]

Hello,

I'm sorry for asking a question that has probably been answered in the past, but I couldn't find a clear and precise answer on the subject on your website or any web resource.

We are a private company and we wonder how to deal with developments using open source.

First of all we are not a software company, and therefore we just provide software applications to our customers, so that they can use our services/buy our products.

We develop with code that may use opensource, both:

- 1. Pure internal software
- 2. Software for our customers provided as Web applications (that obviously interacts with a part of our internal software).
- 3. Software for our customers provided as mobile applications (IOS&Android apps) that interacts with a part of our internal software.

The usage we make of opensource, is either use the opensource products as standalone products (e.g Maven, Kados..), or use them 'as is' as libraries (most java or javascript) (e.g POI, jQuery...).
We do not modify or enhance the open source code of the used libraries.
At last, our code must be kept as proprietary and we don't consider providing the source code using the opens source libraries.

I have read quite a few pages on the opensource.org website, the FAQ and other external papers, but it seems that the licences discussions and restrictions, concern most of the time the usage of the open source in commercial products, or concern the distribution of open sources modifications.

First of all, I would like to know if a software provided to our customers in our case, is considered in the open source terminology as a 'customer product'.
Second, I would like to understand what 'distribution' stands for. Is distributing a web application or mobile application considered 'distribution' ?
We provide some binary code that may contain usages of open source libraries, to some of our subsidiaries. Is it also considered as 'distribution' ?

The idea behind these questions is to know if in fact we have to care about using Open source software or not in our situation..

If indeed we provide a commercial product and we are considering distributing software that may require the usage of opensource libraries for being able to work, indeed, I guess we are concerned by Open source usage.
If it's the case, I will have more precise questions regarding the usage we make of these libraries, to understand what licences we may use and what we may not.

Thank you.

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Le groupe Coface, un leader mondial de l'assurance-crédit, propose aux  entreprises du monde entier des solutions pour les protéger contre le risque de défaillance financière de leurs clients. Ses 4 400 collaborateurs assurent un service de proximité dans 67 pays.

The Coface Group, a worldwide leader in credit insurance, offers companies around the globe solutions to protect them against the risk of financial default of their clients. 4 400 staff in 67 countries provide a local service worldwide. 


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