Proprietary software
Software whose licence does not grant general freedoms to modify and redistribute it.
What is proprietary software?
Proprietary software grants usage rights under terms that do not provide the general freedoms of free or open-source software. Modification and redistribution in particular may be restricted. Price alone is insufficient to identify it: software offered at no charge can also be proprietary. Visible source code likewise does not establish general permission to modify or redistribute it.
A fictional company tries portal software under a free demonstration licence. That does not mean another provider may later modify or redistribute it independently. Before selection, the company clarifies the specific version, licence scope, planned use and rights needed for maintenance and handover. Support availability and export options are examined separately. The licence category alone assesses neither product quality nor suitability for the company’s workflow.
Sources
Related terms
- Software licenceThe terms under which rights to software are granted.
- Open sourceSoftware whose licence meets the freedoms and conditions defined for open source.
- Legacy systemAn existing system still in use, with technical and business dependencies accumulated over time.
- Multi-tenancyMulti-tenancy supports separate customer or group scopes in one solution. A tenant is not automatically one person or one database.
- Browser cacheThe browser cache stores suitable HTTP responses for later use. Reuse and revalidation follow the applicable rules.
- Cache invalidationCache invalidation ends reuse of a stored copy under defined rules. The source record remains a separate concern.
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