Re: Who owns the database - client or software vendor?

>  From:    colin.williams@technocrats.co.uk (Colin Williams)
>  
>  If a software vendor supplies a system to a client, who owns the
>  database, the client or the vendor?

It depends on the legal contract between the software supplier & the client.
There are many variations on such contracts.

Normally, in the consumer marketplace in the USA, the vendor packages the 
software in shrink wrap in which there is excruciatingly tiny print that 
promises nothing & gives the client zero rights, but this is modified by 
whatever legislation exists in the host country to give the client certain 
unalienable computer rights such as backing up software (making a copy for 
insurance against computer mishaps).

In actual practice, the number of purchasers who actually read this contract 
is vanishingly small.

Normally, in the consultant marketplace, there is a contract between the 
client and the solution provider that spells out what belongs to whom & what 
rights the client might have to modify whatever the vendor provides, and what 
information is to be kept confidential.  We have on multiple occasions taken 
such contracts to lawyers & auditors to resolve differences of opinion in 
interpretation.  I believe this sort of thing ought to be done before the 
signing of the contract.  Sometimes there is room for negotiation with the 
vendor to get some language in the contract that the client desires.

In actual practice, the client's technical staff working on the provided 
software rarely if ever see the contract & often make assumptions about the 
rules that may be unjustified.  End users tend to be oblivious that there is 
any such set of rules.

Likewise, the vendor's technical staff that is helping the client site - they 
are rarely if ever told when a particular client has a contract that is an 
exception to the standard rules of engagement.

Since vendors periodically revise their contracts, and often behave like the 
latest re-write is the official version, it behooves their clients to hang 
onto the version that was actually signed in case some dispute arises in the 
future.

>  And if the client has rights to the data, does he not also have rights
>  to access that data using tools that are independent of the vendor?

Generally the data is the property of the client - everything else is subject 
to the terms of the agreement by which the data base software was aquired, 
and any relevant laws where this is being used.

Rights of access, other than what the vendor provides, exist only if the 
contract says so, or if laws in the nation involved supercede the relevant 
language of the contract.  Many contracts do in fact allow this, but some do 
not, which is a consideration that should be reviewed before a client aquires 
a software package.

>  Does this also mean he has rights to the layout of those files in the
>  database, so that he can actually use the tools on the data?

Some contracts allow other tools to be used, some do not.

>  Without the layout, the database is nothing right?

If the vendor software is of good quality, and the client education in its 
use is of good quality, then a data base can be of immense value, with zero 
access to layout or source code, but it is not my preferred way of doing 
business.  I like to have the source code & an agreement that protects my 
employer in the event that the vendor goes south.

There have been cases of vendors going bankrupt in which all the clients who 
are using what belongs to that vendor - they get socked by the bankrupsy 
court for $$$$$ over & above what the contract agreed to.

Al Macintyre  ©¿©
http://www.cen-elec.com MIS Manager Programmer & Computer Janitor
+---
| This is the Midrange System Mailing List!
| To submit a new message, send your mail to MIDRANGE-L@midrange.com.
| To subscribe to this list send email to MIDRANGE-L-SUB@midrange.com.
| To unsubscribe from this list send email to MIDRANGE-L-UNSUB@midrange.com.
| Questions should be directed to the list owner/operator: david@midrange.com
+---