Tuesday, September 9, 2008

Notes for Chapter 5 of "Beyond Software Architecture"

Chapter 5 "Technology in-licensing"

This chapter talks about how different technologies can be integrated into a software architecture by licensing. A general point is that using code or components by licensing can save the energy and time of the key technical employees. On the other hand, it is important to have lawyers to clarify the relevant issues when licenses are involved.

There are many risks/rewards for using licensed technologies. One should keep all these in mind when being at the front of such decisions. Actually this is not only about component-based software. An OS can be a licensed technology to an enterprise. Such considerations of risks/rewards still apply here.

Another thing to be careful with is the software itself may have a different pricing model that conflicts with the licensed technologies. Here the software architecture matters. It should be designed to solve the conflict.

Open source technology is always a good consideration, but one has to bear in mind the pros and cons behind it. Every open source software license is different.

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