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Open Source Code In a Closed Source Company
An anonymous reader writes "I have code that I've written for my current company that I'd like to open-source. The only problem is that my company has the usual clause that says that anything I write belongs to them. Now that they've decided to abandon my code for another product that replaces its function, I'd like to continue working on my project as well as open it up to the world. The easy part is cleaning it up and posting it on SourceForge and Freshmeat. The hard part is making sure that I am free of any legal complications in the future. I've looked online to try to find a legal document I could present to my employer to get them to sign off on it, but I'm not having any luck. Has anyone else been in this boat or can refer me to some legal documentation that may help out?"
As parent says, they own the code. If they want to abandon it they still own it and don't automatically abandon rights to the code.
Ask them if they are prepared to release the code and if not, why not.
If their major concern is laibility, then get the code signed over to another party who will shield them from liability. THis might be yourself or EFF or whatever.
If they still won't well you're screwed as it is theirs.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Print the code you want to release, pedantic I know, but legal folks like paper. Draft a simple document that says the attached code is going to be released under XXX license (whatever you can agree on with them) and that the company agrees to the action and that any derivation/modification to the released code is copyright the respective author going forward (your choice of license probably will take care of this for you).
Affix the license, the document, and the code. Have a legal officer of the company sign the document, initial all the pages of code and the license in front of a notory, and have the notory do their thing and seal it.
Should work for any trivial amount of code. As was joked about in another post, I doubt you'd want to try this with Ballmer and the Office code base, but if you think your company will let you get by with it in the first place, its probably enough. The key thing is that you've got their sig and its notorized properly so you can't be sued later for releasing their IP into the public spotlight without permission cause lets face it, once the code is out there, they aren't going to put it back in the bottle, they at best will sue you for releasing it.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Sorry dude, you're out of luck. The code is still theirs. Their ownership of it is not predicated on whether or not they actually decide to use it.
You can always ask them if they'll give it to you. I've done this successfully. If they really have no interest in it, they might be willing to discard it.
We are the fire that lights our world.. and we are the fire that consumes it.
Who modded this flamebait? Its the reality of the situation, its not 'his code' it is 'the companies code' if he wrote it under what would be considered time they paid him for. If he did it completely off work resources and outside the scope of work, its another story, but it was obviously written with knowledge of a work requirement since they were using it, that implies work resources were put in on it even if its nothing more than 'my company needs this' because he had inside knowledge. If you don't like these terms, don't sign the employment contract or negotiate the right to do your own work outside the company under your own license. Thats what I did. The only catch is that my company has the right to use any code I develop while I work for them (but outside of work) for their own products, including modifications. Which works entirely fine by me as it means my CVS repository is backed up on servers at my office as well, the versions stay in sync because I make sure that any changes that need to be made to my code get done in my free time and imported back into the repository at work. We both benefit. They get free code, I get to work on things without fear of being hassled about it later. I must admit though, the owner of the company I work for treats his employees as if they are his own children, so this is probably not your typical setup at but its been that way at the 4 small companies I've worked for.
Persistent Volume manager for Kubernetes - https://github.com/dwimsey/openshift-pvmanager
Oh, come off it man. There's all kinds of stories posted on slash relating to IP and the Law. Plus this guy obviously doesn't know anymore than the rest of us, so maybe he's just looking for another goob that's been there. I think there's been some good advice around here. Personally, I'd go to a paralegal, but I don't think he's looking to spend any cash. So, someone that might have personal experience is really the next place to go. If you don't like it why not just GTFO?
Under the influence of Post-Cyberpunk Gonzo Journalism
I do this all the time, in fact most of my open source code was done on someone else's dime.
Your situation is going to be tricky because you (I assume) don't have a precedent of doing it (they didn't hire you based on your other open source work) and don't have any agreement in place. I also assume you are a permanent employee instead of a contractor (it can be easier to open source work as a contractor in some countries).
The above stuff isn't critical, but it smooths the process.
What's tricky for you is there aren't any good BUSINESS reasons for them to do it either.
If either your code, or the code that replaced it, is profit-impacting then forget it. No sane company would open source a profitable codebase, nor will they risk releasing an old product that you could then take and create a competitor.
The best arguments for open sourcing in a company that isn't a software company are:
1. Having other users means free testing, free reports, maybe some free patches. In rare cases, it means you become the industry standard/leader in an area (and control is good, from a company perspective).
2. Because you will continue working on the project after you leave them, they in effect continue to retain you as an employee without having to pay you.
Those are the direct benefits, there's more reasons (mostly more subtle).
Sadly, neither of these apply in your case.
You are in effect dumpster-diving in their repository, asking for charity. And your work on that codebase could well distract you from your new one.
It might be possible, but it's going to be damned hard.
Good luck though.
Perhaps its a new reader trying to get involved with the community (and perhaps asked several places to try and get the most eyes)? It is true that these things have been discussed liked crazy on /., but largely only in terms of lawyers and copyright laws. I don't recall anyone recently posting how to interact with their bosses on the matter. I'm sure there needs to be some level of documentation, but what does that consist of exactly? You'd want to make sure its documented so that if it is open-sourced and becomes popular, no one can come back and say "I didn't authorize this! It's all ours!". But what sort of documentation? Was it a long process, or was it as easy as getting someone to sign one paper saying "Program X is hereby released under the GNU GPL -- signed, The Big Guy, Some Company" and so took all of 30 seconds? Someone here may have dealt with it and can offer some advice that may be more reasonable that someone on the GPL forums, whom only knows what the license says but has never actually bargained with a boss or CEO to get something released.
And if nothing else, its polite to give help when you can. Responses such as yours are a big reason people don't like to learn about Linux or technology in general; whenever they attempt to get involved and learn, they just get yelled at for being newbies and told to go elsewhere. The open source community may have lost a genius member just now because you decided to be a jerk and therefore put off the asker from even wanting to write open source software anymore.
Just remember this next time you have a question about anything (which is inevitable). I don't want to hear it when you're stuck with no answer because everyone yelled "Get lost! You should know the answer."
So, here's a theory - how about just asking?
I work for a large software company (about 10,000 employees) and have released a couple of things into open source. We use Linux / MySQL / Apache / Spring / etc in a big way. A colleague and I wrote some MySQL utilities and some other bits and pieces, but the code we wrote didn't really give away competitive secrets, so I went to my management and asked - and they said "yes".
My company has contributors to at least a half-dozen open source projects that I know of. For example, se use Apache Camel and we contribute. It makes sense for us to share, because the sum of what we get back from the community is more than what we put into it individually (and we give away no secrets).
Now, if the code you wrote is something a competitor could use against your company, don't both asking, you already know the answer.
Alan.
You must be an American... what is *with* you people always reaching for the lawyer every time some little conflict with another person comes up. Stop being a pussy and fight your own battles.
All he has to do is ask his employer if he can have the code. Get the agreement in writing, yes. Hire a lawyer? What the fuck? If I was his employer and he hired a lawyer, I'd fire him.. and don't say I couldn't, I'd find a reason.
How we know is more important than what we know.
Why do people always say these questions don't belong on Slashdot? This question is the perfect example of how Slashdot *actually* works vs. how people *imagine* it works.
The question: I want to open source some code I wrote for work that the company is scrapping.
Expected Slashdot answer: Just do it! Don't ask The Man, he'll only push you down... OSS FTW!!1!
Actual Slashdot answer, overall: It's possible, but you definitely don't have the rights to that code, and it's probably not in the company's best interest to give them to you... so it probably won't hurt to ask, but chances are you'll need to find another project.
Included in that actual answer: details from other developers who've been in the same situation, and comments from actual IT lawyers who work with these issues.
So -- wrong place?
Yes, none of this is "official" legal advice (though about as close as you can get for free & online), and if the questioner wants to try something risky, he should pay to get that legal advice... but now he knows what "risky" even means in this situation (he didn't know before) and has some idea of if it's worth pushing for it (probably not).
So: can we just hash out a new feature for Ask Slashdot postings? Have the editor just flag the question as "responses might contain legality discussions"... and automatically include regular disclaimer text saying "reminder: comments in this discussion are not legal advice." Or add a checkbox to the reply form, next to "No Karma Bonus" and "Post Anonymously", called "Include Not-Legal-Advice Disclaimer"?
Then we don't need to fill the comments with all of these disclaimers and warnings, and the actual lawyers don't have to worry about someone pointing back to their comment as "rendered legal advice" and holding them responsible for it being a complete and accurate answer. And (this is not a response to the parent) we can start smacking down the people who always post "Don't ask Slashdot - get a lawyer!" to every single Ask Slashdot story, looking for cheap karma.