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When I did my master's, I explicitly chose 2-clause BSD as the license for all the code I had produced as part of the thesis. My thesis project was done with, a
by bostik 9y ago
When I did my master's, I explicitly chose 2-clause BSD as the license for all the code I had produced as part of the thesis. My thesis project was done with, and paid for, by the university I attended. Since my work was being funded with public money, I felt it only fair to release everything with a liberal license.
The review board expressly noted two things that were out of the norm with my thesis. One: I chose to include source code with my thesis. Every copy came with a CD-ROM. (I even made sure to upload the same archive to the digital library so access to print copies was not required.)
And two: the review board made a point of mentioning that I released the sources for my thesis project with a very liberal license. What I had considered only fair, the board considered out of the ordinary.
Footnote - I didn't include just the sources. I included the entire .svn/ hierarchy to provide complete editing history.
Footnote 2 - I picked up git in 2007. Thesis was done in 2006.
- lsh 9y agoReally well done. A decade later it's still a struggle to get some basic things negotiated and signed off when code is part of a submission, like an open license, a specific revision to be pinned to the paper if under version control, or simply getting the code into version control if not. This requires training up and down the line and it's helpful if authors push for these basic things because if a formal process isn't in place to handle exotic content like code, then it may get dropped from the final submission because it's simply too much of an effort for everybody.
- ams6110 9y agoInteresting. I thought that kind of stuff (code) would be the intellectual property if the University and subject to their licensing terms.
- type0 9y agoI think that the history should be mandatory also for the comments (i.e. from your adviser or reviewer). That could apply for other scientific disciplines as well and give a very good indication on the quality of the process that the thesis went trough, sadly academics are the worst people to agree on anything.
- bostik 9y agoNow this would be a novel approach. A proper review and comment history attached... I like it. I'm actually going to toss this idea to the people I still know at my university.