The ODA Consortium, which to date has been funded entirely by its members, is a European Economic Interest Grouping (EEIG). These groupings are intended to foster co-operative ventures between independent companies. An EEIG has a ready-made legal framework that meets the needs and supports the aims of the ODA Consortium.
Close working contacts are maintained with other companies and organizations through several different channels: the Advisory Group keeps users and interested observers in touch with developments, the Technical and Business Committees maintain close contact with the standards organizations and groups that are implementing and developing the ODA standard.
The ODA Consortium warmly welcomes new members.
The aims of the ODA Consortium are:
The Toolkit is openly licensed to anyone wanting to develop products using the ODA standard.
The ODA Consortium Toolkit is designed to assist individual suppliers in providing applications that are completely relevant to their needs and to those of their customers. It is a single product, providing interworking across different hardware and operating systems. It can be used by anyone intending to develop applications that utilize the ODA standard, for example, a converter to and from a proprietary word processing format or a long-term storage system for re-processable documents.
The Toolkit is a platform of generic software that facilitates the handling of ODIF data streams and the creation of applications that use Open Document Architecture. It consists of the following major components:
The Toolkit is usable by anyone intending to develop applications that utilize the ODA standard. Examples could include: a converter to and from a proprietary word processing format or a long-term storage system for re-processable documents. The same software is designed to operates in different hardware and operating environments. This first release is available in object code for Windows 3 and in source code form for UNIX XPG3 platforms.
The Toolkit's consistent interfaces and specifications expedite the creation of applications conforming to the ODA standard and DAPs. The Toolkit includes the following components:
The Toolkit Version 1 Release 1.0 is available from March, 1993. This supports the FOD11 and FOD26 DISPs. The Toolkit Version 1 Release 2.0 is available from March, 1994. This supports FOD11, FOD26, and FOD36.
The Toolkit has been validated on different hardware and software platforms of six major computer companies and proven to support application inter-working. New features and enhancements to the Toolkit will be based on evolution of the ODA standard and internationally agreed DAPs.
The Toolkit APIs have been submitted to the European Computer Manufacturers Association (ECMA) for standardization.
The ODA Consortium Toolkit is primarily designed to be used by Applications. By that we mean any software, whether for general document processing or for specific business needs, that is written to make direct use of functionality provided by the Toolkit. The Toolkit is openly available for anyone to use for this purpose. (In some cased an Application may be a very simple mechanism to operate the Toolkit functions.)
The Consortium does not aim to make a profit from the Toolkit but does charge modest license fees and user royalties in order to recover the considerable costs of developing the Toolkit.
This document explains how the Toolkit may be used in the context of the available licenses but has no significance in regard to legal interpretation of the actual license documents. The ODA Consortium shall not be bound by the terms of this information.
The Consortium has a three part licensing plan to make the Toolkit openly available to support the purposes of:
This allows a number of specific people within the organization to use the Toolkit to develop Applications software that calls the Toolkit functionality. They can copy the Toolkit for development of security purposes and each of them can operate the Applications on any one machine at a time. (One person running the Toolkit on several machines would be counted as several "users".)
This license does not permit the developers to distribute copies of the Toolkit or Applications including the Toolkit for use by any third parties within or outside their organization. That would require a separate "User License" or "Distribution License".
However there are technically two possibilities. Applications software can be produced to include the Toolkit (static linking) or not include the Toolkit (dynamic linking). Thus, when the Toolkit is not included, Application developers may distribute copies of their Application without any additional license or payment to the Consortium. Such applications could only be used by people who have otherwise obtained a license to operate the Toolkit.
Applications Development licensed are available for single users (price US $1000) or for a total of five users (price US $2000). For example if the organization wanted to license eight developers it would be appropriate to obtain two of the five user licenses.
This allows a number of specific people within the organization to operate the Toolkit or any Applications using the Toolkit. This would be of use for example when the organization has developed its own Toolkit Applications or has obtained rights to use copies of Applications not including the Toolkit.
If an organization obtains rights to use copies of Applications that do include the Toolkit such a license is not required. In that case the distributor of the Applications would be responsible for paying royalties to the Consortium.
End user Run-Time licenses are available for three users (price US $500) or for a total of ten users (price US $1000) or for a total of 100 users (price US $2000). For example if the organization wanted to license 150 users it would be appropriate to obtain two of the 100 user licenses (but larger organizations should also consider the Distribution License).
This allows an organization to distribute run-time copies of the Toolkit or Applications including the Toolkit. This would be appropriate for software vendors or an economic alternative for large organizations requiring more than 200 End User Run-Time licenses.
It is a multi-tier license, that is the recipients of copies may be End Users or may be sub-licensed to further distribute copies. In any case the holder of the original Distribution License is responsible to pay royalties to the Consortium for each of the total number of End-Users this produces.
The price per copy in any one calendar year depends on the number of copies sold during that year. For less than 10,001 it is US $5 per copy, subject to a minimum payment of US $5000. Then up to 50,000 copies it is US $2.50 per copy, up to 100,000 copies it is US $1.50 per copy, and above 100,000 copies it is US $0.75 per copy. (It is useful to notice that the remainder of the calendar year when the license is issued together with all of the subsequent year count as one calendar year for this purpose.)
The Consortium wants its Toolkit to be available on many different platforms and therefore it makes the source available to other organizations for the purpose of porting to any platforms provided that the interfaces and data stream formats are not modified. Provided the licensee pays a minimum of $20,000 for the right to distribute copies according to a Distribution License there is no additional charge for access to the source code.
The Consortium licensing plans may change and terms and conditions may differ from those described above.
Application Development Licenses may be ordered by post or fax from the address below. Availability and details may be confirmed by telephone. Orders should specify: