Licence and project continuity

ApkPy is open source. Since 1.13.0 the whole of it — the translator from Python to Android, the Previewer and the apkpy command — is published under the Apache License 2.0, in the repository the package on PyPI is built from.

What the licence lets you do

Use ApkPy for personal and commercial work, read it, change it, and redistribute it or your changed version. In return, a copy of ApkPy that you redistribute keeps the licence and its notices, and marks the files you changed. There is no fee and nothing to sign.

The apps you build are yours

ApkPy writes some of its own code into every app it builds: Java classes, layouts and other resources. By the letter of the Apache licence, shipping that would mean shipping the licence and its notices with your app.

An exception at the end of the LICENSE file removes that. What ApkPy writes into your project or embeds in your app you may use, change and redistribute as part of your app, as source or compiled, without those conditions. Your app is under whatever terms you choose.

The examples are covered the same way. Copy one from the repository, or let apkpy start or apkpy examples write one, and it is yours to build an app on.

The libraries an Android app is built with — AndroidX, Material Components, OkHttp, and Google's when you use them — have their own licences, as in any Android app.

The name

The licence covers the code, not the name "ApkPy". A changed version that is published needs a name of its own.

Earlier releases

Releases up to 1.12.1 were published under a proprietary licence and stay under it. From 1.13.0 on, the licence is Apache 2.0.

Continuity

ApkPy used to promise that its source would be published if the project were ever abandoned. The promise is kept in advance: the source is public, under a licence that lets anyone maintain and continue it, whatever happens to the project.

Read How ApkPy is tested for what was validated and Community and support for how to take part.