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You only need to prove you owned the sourcecode at that time. An unopened envelope with a read only medium works, if it is just one time.
Any pro that can afford it could try to patent it. Good luck with that.
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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Not to belabor my point...But, no, in the US the old "mail yourself a letter and don't open it" does not work at all...Ever! It is NOT admissible as evidence in court. And the Copyright Office won't accept it either. Just Google on this topic or ask a professional. This myth has been going around and around for decades.
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In Europe it once did; the poststamp and the CD (for you kids, that's a small DVD) would be sufficient to prove ownership if challenged.
Bastard Programmer from Hell
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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Have you estimated what the code would be worth to one of your competitors ?
Once you let your source code out into the wild, that's it .. even with good intentions & contracts, can they keep it secure etc ??
I think if you were going to let them have source, you'd have to charge more than just the license cost, just to protect you against the possible damage of it 'running free'
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It's only "damage" if it negates any further potential sales you might have made of the license. In this case, it sounds like it's the second potential user of the code in "several years" which suggests it's not exactly mass-market. Ask yourself if you expect to sell further licenses; if not, there's no real harm done to you if it does find it's way into the public domain.
I'd make sure to put some sort of unique "marker" into the code (even if it's just an oddly-named function call) to differentiate this version from the original. That way if it does get shared around, you may be able to trace which of your clients allowed it to escape and you may be able to claim compensation in that event anyway.
There are plenty of examples of licenses around on the internet, and if you're a member of an appropriate trade organisation (e.g. in the UK IPSE- The Association of Independent Professionals and the Self-Employed[^]) they should be able to provide templates for you and possibly free advice too.
In the past I've licensed entire web applications (highly customisable, but each including a unique http header in all responses). It was a trivial "clue" but one that one of my ex-clients overlooked when they broke the license agreement and cloned it for a second site. I found it, had a solicitor send a single letter, and they settled for 66% of the original license fee - a five-figure sum. Effort on my part - a 20-minute meeting.
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Yeah.. Never heard of a product being copied that way. The idea that source is valuable is bullshit, most can be built in days. Your source isn't that special.
Now, that's not the same as licensing options, that's simply about selling what you built. But licensing isn't about protecting it. Anyone can see your code.
Licensing is about monetizing code, not about protecting it.
Bastard Programmer from Hell 
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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I put a GPLv3 license on my open-source software. It basically says that the code can be used freely as long as the resulting code is also open-source. However, it also allows the software to be licensed under another license approved by the FSF. Commercial software usually wants to be proprietary, which another FSF-approved license allows. But someone who wants that license instead of GPLv3 would have to pay. If you're willing to take the risk that they could just open-source their software so they don't have to pay, you could use the GPLv3 license after verifying this approach for yourself, as I didn't consult a lawyer.
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Firstly, if you're selling software, you're always only selling licenses, regardless of whether you are providing the source code or not.
Secondly, this is a common occurrence, and you give the the same license as yo wold have with selling compiled binaries, with an extra NDA clause that prevents them from opening up your source code to the world. Everything else stays the same, mostly.
For example, I usually add a clause, in addition to the NDA, that allows the licensee unlimited use of the source and software as long as the other license restrictions are adhered to. If they break the license they are no longer a licensee and there not eligible to use the license.
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Member 13301679 wrote: Firstly, if you're selling software, you're always only selling licenses, regardless of whether you are providing the source code or not.
Ehr, no. And one needs to specify what is sold. But you might be selling all your work, without having any rights.
Member 13301679 wrote: in addition to the NDA
NDA isn't valid here.
Welcome to Europe.
Bastard Programmer from Hell
"If you just follow the bacon Eddy, wherever it leads you, then you won't have to think about politics." -- Some Bell.
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Eddy Vluggen wrote: But you might be selling all your work, without having any rights.
What it is usually done in the PLC Industry, customers buy the working solution and the source code, although I always kept the copyright and the right to further use my own created functionality, but only the generic stuff that can be used everywhere, in the moment that was something relative to the industrial line I had programmed, it was ownership of the customer and could not be re-used.
M.D.V. 
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
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There is Copyright and Ownership considerations, and the impact on other NDAs and Contracts you may have signed, plus the "Work-For-Hire" rules that might apply to you.
I've learned a hard lesson on this. After working with my attorney, we went with a dual ownership license for one client who demanded (and paid) for code ownership. We each owned a non-infringement COPY of the code, that came along with a dual non-compete.
My excitement to help a prior company get off the ground, resulted in me losing control of my own code, that I had a documented history of. Simply because the "crook/liar/cheat" on the other end of the table would lie through his teeth under oath, and I would not. [Our court system is a joke in this regard]
I was stuck with an untenable situation. Worse, if the people you are working with today EVER sell the company to some Hedge Fund who sees a chance to leverage your work, they behave very differently than the person who signed the contract with you.
Finally, I stopped doing a lot of work where I deliver the source. The client can "own" their compiled programs/scripts/etc. But I consider my source like Lawyers consider their Template Contracts! (Imagine a law firm that, once they write a contract, is disallowed from ever using those same paragraphs, or SIMILAR paragraphs in a future contract... Even for a similar company, in a similar situation? But, somehow, Source Code, and the knowledge and years that leverages it's creation, can have such restrictions placed against it, and in some NDAs include FUTURE enhancements to said code! Meaning the law firm, if they make the paragraph even better for me, CANNOT use that enhancement in future contracts).
Good Luck!
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About the licensing you already have some good answers, but most of them are considering the licensing of the software as they know it, not in the PLC world.
Working with PLCs, it is really easy to get a copy of the PLC content (a.k.a. the source code), most PLCs and some robot vendors save the code in a easy to download and readable format (heck, some robots have it in plain text) and the security possibilities are not that good (even the "KNOW-HOW-PROTECT" of Siemens is relative easily bypassed).
Considering it I see a big fat problem with this, and is... how to find out / prove the license break.
Example:
You program the PLCs at customer 1 with your software, a third party comes to do add a new small station that has to interact with the sps and takes a copy from online, adds or changes code, transfer back the new version.
Time later (with a big portion of luck) you find your code in a completely different place, because the guy that was at customer 1 kept the copy of the code and liked some of your functions and started using them.
Here would be "relative" easy to find out who copied and (ab)used your work. But that would be a copyright problem against that 3rd party guy, but not a license problem.
And none of the companies you visit could be considered guilty, or would have to pay you any "damage" for it.
M.D.V.
If something has a solution... Why do we have to worry about?. If it has no solution... For what reason do we have to worry about?
Help me to understand what I'm saying, and I'll explain it better to you
Rating helpful answers is nice, but saying thanks can be even nicer.
modified 3-Aug-21 16:59pm.
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modification of it in clue is unfortunate (12)
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infelicitous
"I didn't mention the bats - he'd see them soon enough" - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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Beat me by THAT much. Spent too long on UN... anagrams 
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
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So did I Peter then I saw it - you can take it if you like I've done plenty lately
"I didn't mention the bats - he'd see them soon enough" - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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I've done 3 in the last week or two, so you keep it.
Software rusts. Simon Stephenson, ca 1994. So does this signature. me, 2012
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"I didn't mention the bats - he'd see them soon enough" - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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Do you really think that I would get up in the middle of the night for that?
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats.
His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
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If you were setting a clue at 9.00am your time it wouldn't be the middle of the night
"I didn't mention the bats - he'd see them soon enough" - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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That's true, but the OP's post suggests that it's always at 9 AM his time. Depending on where you sit on the world, this could be in the middle of the night. You are not one of those flat Earth guys, right?
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats.
His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
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CodeWraith wrote: You are not one of those flat Earth guys, right?
I have proof the Earth is not flat: we have cats. If it was flat, they would have pushed everything off the edge by now ...
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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They still if they wanted to. After all, they are still deities.
I have lived with several Zen masters - all of them were cats.
His last invention was an evil Lasagna. It didn't kill anyone, and it actually tasted pretty good.
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it's already 9pm here! 
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