Story: free documentation
This page is for journalists who write about open knowledge and documentation. Many open source projects license their code freely but not their manuals. Exponential's documentation is free documentation: anyone may copy, translate, adapt and redistribute it.
Contents
The story in one paragraph
The documentation in the repository's doc/ directory, including the help in the administration, is
"Copyright (C) 1998 - 2026 Exponential Foundation and 7x. All rights reserved." and licensed under the GNU Free
Documentation License, Version 1.3 or later, with no invariant sections and no cover texts
(The license of this documentation). A plain-words page explains what that lets readers do:
read, copy, share, translate, adapt and cite it (Free documentation). Older pages inherited
from eZ Systems keep their original terms. Around the documentation, the community keeps the eZpedia wiki under the
GFDL since 2006, and free training books are mirrored on GitHub.
Facts you can print
| Fact | Source |
|---|---|
| The documentation is under the GNU FDL 1.3 or any later version | The license of this documentation |
| The notice covers the help pages, guides, installation chapters, 6.x feature pages, changelogs and history | What the notice covers |
| Pre-6.0 documents of eZ Systems keep their own terms (GPL v2) | Older pages with their own terms |
| Contributions to the documentation are accepted under the same license | Contributing to the documentation |
| The help shows the license on every page | The license of this documentation |
| eZpedia: "The free eZ Publish encyclopedia that anyone can edit", since 2006, under the GNU FDL | The community |
| Training books, "eZ Publish Training Books (100% Compatible With Exponential)", as free PDFs | same |
What not to claim
| Do not say | Say instead |
|---|---|
| "Creative Commons documentation" | GNU FDL 1.3 or later |
| "All documentation is GFDL" | The project's own pages are; inherited older pages keep their terms |
| "Public domain" | Copyrighted and freely licensed |
Angles and headline ideas
- "The manual is as free as the code."
- "Twenty years of a community wiki."
- "Translate the docs: allowed by license."
Who to ask
7x and the Foundation through Press contacts; the Foundation names documentation in its mission (The Exponential Foundation for reporters).
Related pages
- Quoting and reusing the documentation
- Story: the help system
- Talking points: help and free documentation
- Free documentation: this page is free to copy, translate and improve under the GNU FDL 1.3.