I am a college student, and have never really been part of a large coding project before. Recently, I have been in discussion with a small business (a member of this small business is an old aquaintance who respects me for my coding ability) to build a web application for them. Now, this would be my first experience building a web application for a different company, however I have worked on my college's website as the assistant to the webmaster (a workstudy position), and have also written things for my own and sibling's websites.
Being as this would be my first project for another company, but may not be the last, I am interested in what other monks think and do in regard to code ownership. What rights to the code should I ask for and deserve?
- Is it ethical/good business practice to say that I want to own all of the code. This could be beneficial for me if I were ever contracted to do a similar project later on. Also, any project most likely has some base classes, some of which could be re-used on projects that aren't even similar.
- The other hand is leaving the code with the employer. They paid for the code I wrote; they paid for the final product, so for the sake of their financial inverstment, is it best to just leave the code with the company. (I would, however, ask that I be allowed to keep a personal copy for my own library, and possibly for example of my workmanship.)
I have read through all of the opinions in Code Samples and Previous Employers, and I have done my best to learn from what I have read. It's a very informative read, by the way, I suggest reading it. Anyway, I think my case is a little different in that I am not already bound by an agreement, but am in the process of making an agreement with this company. I think this question is unique enough from that question to merrit a different thread.
I am eager to hear what you think about this, and what you tend to do in similar situations. Thanks!
-Bryan
Side Note: I'm Seeking some Perl Wisdom in order to Meditate on it, so I wasn't sure where to post. Sorry if it's the wrong place!