The Server Side Public License is a source-available license for software that a provider offers as a service. Anyone may use, modify, and redistribute the program. A provider who offers the program as a service to others must release, under the same license, the service-management software used to run that offer.
The text started from the Affero General Public License (AGPL). That earlier license already covers software offered as a network service. This license adds a further duty aimed at the tools around the service, not only at the program itself.
What a Service Provider Must Release
- The program. Modifications to the licensed program are released under the same terms.
- The service stack. Software used to offer the program as a service to third parties is released as well, when the license’s duty applies.
- Internal use. Running the program only for one’s own organization does not, by itself, trigger the service-provider duty.
This License and Its Predecessor
| Compared | This License | The Predecessor |
| Offering the program as a service | Triggers a release duty | Triggers a release duty for the program |
| Management tools around that service | Included in the release duty | Not the extra subject of the duty |
| Use inside one organization | Does not, by itself, trigger the service duty | The network duty is aimed at users outside the operator |
