CLA
Law & Legal abbreviation · Contract
| Stands for | Contributor license agreement |
|---|---|
| Categories | Law & Legal |
CLA stands for Contributor license agreement, a contract abbreviation also used in technology.
Agreement that contributors to an open-source project sign, granting the project or its sponsoring company a license to, or ownership of, their contributions, often including patent rights. It gives the maintainer clear rights to distribute and relicense the code.
Example: The pull request is blocked until you sign the project's CLA through the bot.
Usage notes
Some projects use the lighter Developer Certificate of Origin (DCO), introduced by the Linux kernel in 2004, in which contributors certify with each commit that they have the right to submit the code. Critics argue CLAs let companies relicense community code under proprietary terms. The Apache Software Foundation's individual CLA is a widely copied model.
Related abbreviations
More contract abbreviations
- BAA – Business associate agreement
- BATNA – Best alternative to a negotiated agreement
- CA – Confidentiality agreement
- CDA – Confidential disclosure agreement
- CIIAA – Confidential information and invention assignment agreement
- CISG – United Nations Convention on Contracts for the International Sale of…
- CPFF – Cost-plus-fixed-fee
- CRADA – Cooperative research and development agreement
- CTA – Clinical trial agreement
- DFARS – Defense Federal Acquisition Regulation Supplement
- DPA – Data processing agreement
- EPC – Engineering, procurement and construction
See all 57 contract abbreviations →
This entry is for general education and is not legal advice. Abbreviation use varies between institutions; always confirm in context.