Ableton CLA

Our open source projects allow you to use them, modify them to your needs, and share them with others. If you have improvements to them, we are happy and grateful to be able to integrate your changes into our repositories.

For us to be able to integrate non-trivial contributions into our repositories, we require you to sign a “Contributor License Agreement” (CLA). This document clarifies the ways in which we can use and incorporate your changes. You are only required to submit the agreement once, and then you will be able to contribute to any of our projects at any time you want.

Ok, what’s next?

We use DocuSign to allow signing the CLA without printing and mailing a document. Please follow this link to get to the signature process. After the document is signed, the maintainers of the Ableton open source repositories will be notified.

FAQ

Why is a CLA necessary?

You own the code that you write, even if is a modification of another open source project. For us to be able to use your changes, we need your explicit permission to do so. The CLA makes it clear that you give us permission to redistribute your changes in our repository. It also ensures that once you have provided a contribution, you cannot try to withdraw permission for its use at a later date. People and companies can therefore use the project, confident that they will not be asked to stop using pieces of the code at a later date, and that Ableton will be able to evolve and maintain the project without having to ask individual contributors for permission. It also allows us to use the changes in some of our proprietary projects. This is important for us to be able to fund, develop and maintain our open source projects.

No, you are simply giving us permission, via a license, to do most things that copyright allows you to do. You are still the copyright holder of the changes.

What if I made my changes as part of my job?

You can only submit contributions that you own yourself. Under most employment contracts, your employer owns whatever you do as part of your work. If that is the case, someone with authority to do so should sign the CLA on behalf of the company. The CLA is a legal declaration by you that you have the right to grant such a license for your contributions. Be careful to make sure that is true.

Can I withdraw permission to use my contributions at a later date?

No. This is one of the reasons we require a CLA. No individual contributor can hold such a threat over the entire community of users. Once you make a contribution, you are saying we can use that piece of code forever.

Can I submit patches without having signed the CLA?

No. We ask all new contributors and patch submitters to sign the CLA before they submit anything substantial.

Trivial patches like spelling fixes or missing words in the documentation won’t require an agreement, since anybody could do those. However, almost anything will require a CLA.

Acknowledgements

Parts of this FAQ are derived from the Django CLA FAQ, which is distributed under a CC-BY license.