Open Source Restcomm License versus Telestax Restcomm Enterprise Subscription License
Type of license
Open Source AGPLv3
Enterprise Subscription
Must contribute modifications to Restcomm source code back to the open source community
Yes
No
Public reference
Must acknowledge use of Restcomm
Published by Telestax
Indemnification
No
Yes
Limited Warranty and Limited Liability
No
Yes
Product Support
Public forum
Telestax
Service Level Agreement
No
Self-service support portal
No
Product Patches
As time allows – maybe never
Yes Yes – premium content via Telestax knowledge base Immediate
Back porting product patches to previous releases
No
Yes
Roadmap priority
No – build it yourself
Yes
Code quality
No formal release process
Excellent – QA by Telestax
Cleanliness of code line
Many forks – release early and often
Single stable code line – Fixed release cycles
Secure
Vulnerable to exploits
Deployment options
On premise
Cloud operational support capabilities
No
Sponsored Development
No
Yes – on a project basis
Documentation
No official documentation
Yes – up-to-date
Training
No
Formal training and certification
Technical Account Manager
No
Technology Certified Partners
No
Protected by Telestax commitment On premise, cloud & hybrid certified Yes – high availability, replication, load balancing, auto-scaling, monitoring
Optionally assigned to maximize ROI Knowledgeable certified partners to help with custom development
Detailed Explanation Restcomm™, the most popular open source projects on the market for developing real time communications applications, is available under two licensing agreements. The table above provides a quick view of the major differences between the two license agreements. Below is an explanation for each of the items compared within the table. Many of the items listed in this document are called out specifically in either the AGPLv3 license available at http://www.gnu.org/licenses/agpl-3.0.html or the Telestax© Restcomm™ Subscription Agreement available here.
Contribute source code modifications back to the community
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
Yes
No
Open Source AGPLv3 license As a starting point it is important to understand two key differences between the two licenses. First, any organization deploying Open Source Restcomm as a part of their offering must acknowledge their use of Restcomm within their product or on their website. The second key difference is how modifications to the source code are treated. In the AGPLv3 license, any modification to the open source code must be immediately shared within the community. Each organization that modifies the Open Source Restcomm code must share what they have created. This requirement is why there is a web of forks in the open source Restcomm code because every company will share the source code inclusive of their modifications. Telestax Subscription license Telestax Subscription license relaxes the requirement to contribute changes back to the community. Many organizations that have added enhancements to Restcomm open source by modifying the code may not want to offer them back to the community. Doing so could neutralize their competitive advantage and make their offering weak. This is a strong argument for upgrading to a Telestax Restcomm subscription license. The subscription license relaxes the mandate for sharing modifications made to the Restcomm open source code, allowing their competitive advantage to remain confidential.
Public reference
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
Must acknowledge use of Restcomm
Published by Telestax
Open Source AGPLv3 license Any organization deploying Open Source Restcomm as a part of their offering must acknowledge their use of Restcomm within their product or on their website. Telestax Subscription License Restcomm Enterprise customers agree to allow Telestax to refer to them as Telestax customers as part of the subscription license.
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Indemnification for Third Party Infringement Claims
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Yes
Open Source AGPLv3 license No Indemnification for Third Party Infringement Claims is offered by any organization. Telestax Subscription License Telestax protects and holds harmless its Customers from any third party infringement claim, demand or cause of action that is based upon Telestax Restcomm infringing or violating any United States patents, copyrights, trade secrets or other proprietary rights of a third party. Customers include its officers, employees, agents and representatives. More detail is defined within the terms of the Telestax Subscription license under section 2 “Indemnification for Third Party Infringement Claims”.
Limited Warranty and Limited Liability
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Yes
Open Source AGPLv3 license No Limited Warranty or Limited Liability is offered by any organization. Telestax Subscription license Telestax expressly warrants that it is the owner or licensee of Telestax Restcomm, including any and all copyrights and trade secrets. Telestax warrants that it has the right and authority to enter into a subscription agreement and to license Telestax Restcomm to its customers according to the terms of the subscription agreement. Limited Liability up to the subscription fees paid to Telestax by Customer. More detail is defined within the terms of the Telestax Subscription license under section 1 “Limited Warranty and Limited Liability for Telestax Restcomm”.
Product Support
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
Volunteer
Yes
Open Source AGPLv3 license Developers utilizing Open Source Restcomm will need to seek help from the community when they incur an issue or a lack of understanding about the project code. The community is comprised of volunteers who will do their best to respond but could take some time before a resolution is provided. Telestax Subscription License Telestax is committed to offering the best possible support to its customers based on their needs. Telestax addresses problem resolutions through a number of mechanisms, including defining workarounds, developing hotfixes or patch releases – or through an upcoming general release based on issue severity and priority.
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Service Level Agreement (SLA)
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Yes
Open Source AGPLv3 license Because formal support is not offered with the Open Source Restcomm license, service level agreements are unavailable. Telestax Subscription License Telestax Subscription customers are provided Service Level Agreements (SLA) based on their level of purchased support and severity classification of the issue. More information about Telestax SLA can be found here https://telestax.com/service-level-agreement/.
Self-service support portal
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Yes – premium content via Telestax knowledge base
Open Source AGPLv3 license All support comes voluntarily through the community. Access to the self-service support portal is not available. Telestax Subscription License For Telestax Subscription License customers, a self-service portal is available off the company website and behind customer login credentials. Once inside the portal, customers can search premium content that has been gathered from the Telestax knowledge base for quick resolutions to their issue or question. Many times, customers will find the information they are looking for without having to go through the process of logging a support ticket.
Product Patches
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Yes
Open Source AGPLv3 license Product Patches are not made available under the Open Source Restcomm license. Telestax Subscription License A process has been defined and is adhered to by Telestax that ensures its Subscription license holders can depend on timely resolution. A hotfix or patch release may be followed in the event that a defect is identified within the product that is prioritized with high severity or will impact multiple customers.
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Back porting product patches to previous releases
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Yes
Open Source AGPLv3 license There is no back porting of product patches to previous releases under the Open Source Restcomm license. Telestax Subscription License Customer satisfaction is important to Telestax. We understand that sometimes it is not feasible for a customer to upgrade to a newer release of Restcomm Enterprise to receive a fix to a bug. Telestax will backport product patches to previous releases, depending upon the level of support a customer subscribes to.
Roadmap priority
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No – build it yourself
Yes
Open Source AGPLv3 license Organizations needing features to be added to Open Source Restcomm are encouraged to join the community and contribute their enhancements to the code. Telestax Subscription License Telestax stays very close it its subscription customers. When planning our feature roadmap, we always reach out to our customers to make sure we are meeting their needs.
Code Quality
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
Good – QA by community
Excellent – QA by Telestax
Open Source AGPLv3 license Restcomm is known to offer mature and stable code that is maintained by a vibrant community. No further quality assurance is offered with Open Source Restcomm. Telestax Subscription License Telestax layers a QA infrastructure on top of the Restcomm code maintained by the community. Telestax QA puts Restcomm Enterprise code through rigorous testing to ensure the code our subscription customers can expect is high quality.
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Cleanliness of code line
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
Many forks – release early and often
Single stable code line – fixed release cycles
Open Source AGPLv3 license When an organization wishes to extend Open Source Restcomm to suit their purpose, they add their modification(s) to the source code, which then creates a new version of the code line (Restcomm source code plus modifications). This is what is called forking the code. For every project that produces modifications to the source code, a fork is generated. Based on this process, it is easy to understand that there will exist hundreds of forked code lines for open source Restcomm. Further in the spirit of open source, releasing code lines often and asking the community perform QA in real time could affect the stability of a given Restcomm fork. Telestax Subscription License Telestax performs the exact same process with Restcomm Enterprise that is associated with any enterprise-class software product. Telestax maintains a single stable code line with fixed release cycles. Features that go into release cycles are influenced in two ways. First, Telestax monitors all Open Source Restcomm forks and selects the best and most stable features to incorporate into Restcomm Enterprise. Second Telestax pays close attention to input from our subscription customers as well as understanding the feature advancements within the real time communications market.
Secure
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
Vulnerable to exploits
Protected by Telestax commitment
Open Source AGPLv3 license There is no process followed by the Open Source Restcomm community that protects the code from security breaches. Telestax Subscription License Telestax has a process set in place where security is given the highest level of priority at all times. When an issue is brought to our attention, the Telestax support team immediately focuses on the fix and then quickly makes the patch available to all subscription customers.
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Deployment Options
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
On Premise
Certified on Premise, cloud, hybrid
Open Source AGPLv3 license Open Source Restcomm deployment is available in on premise only. Telestax Subscription License Telestax Restcomm offers unlimited deployment flexibility. Deployments can be on premise, similar to Restcomm open source, in the cloud (public and private) and in hybrid (combination of on premise and cloud).
Operational support capabilities
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Yes – High Availability, Replication, Load Balancing, Auto-scaling, Monitoring
Open Source AGPLv3 license No deployment operational support is available for Open Source Restcomm Open Source Telestax Subscription License Once Restcomm Enterprise applications have been developed and deployed, Telestax offers extended capabilities to manage them efficiently and effectively. Capabilities such as high availability, load balancing and monitoring make managing a deployed Restcomm Enterprise application significantly more straightforward and predictable.
Sponsored Development
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Yes – on a project basis
Open Source AGPLv3 license Hiring Telestax to assist with Open Source Restcomm development projects is not available. Telestax Subscription License From time-to-time organizations will benefit from and reach out to Telestax to assist with specific development projects. Subscription customers may enlist help from Telestax when needed on a project by project basis.
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Documentation
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
Yes – but lagging development
Yes – up-to-date
Open Source AGPLv3 license Open Source Restcomm Open is maintained by a community of individuals who donate their time to the project. Each contributor is responsible for documenting their code. Code tends to be released first with the documentation following over time. Telestax Subscription License Telestax manages its product lifecycle similar to any commercial software vendor. As such a new release of Restcomm Enterprise will simultaneously include the enhanced code line, documentation and training.
Training
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Formal training and certification
Open Source AGPLv3 license No training is made available with for Open Source Restcomm. Telestax Subscription License Telestax offers up-to-date self-paced formal training and certification for subscription customers needing to learn about Restcomm development and deployment. Technical Account Manager
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Optionally assigned to maximize ROI
Open Source AGPLv3 license No Technical Account Manager is made available with for Open Source Restcomm. Telestax Subscription License Depending on the level of subscription support, Telestax offers customers the option to have a Technical Account Manager assigned to them. Technical Account Managers guide their customers through the process of developing and deploying their Restcomm Enterprise applications.
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Technology Certified Partners
Open Source AGPLv3
Telestax Subscription
No
Knowledgeable certified partners to help with custom development
Open Source AGPLv3 license Telestax Technology Certified Partners are not available to help with Open Source Restcomm custom application development. Telestax Subscription License Telestax works closely with selected implementation partners to provide high quality custom application development for subscription customers. Technology Certified Partners have been vetted for Restcomm knowledge, quality development implementations and customer satisfaction.
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