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The LibraryODERSA publishing house
An ODERSA resource · Knowledge programmeA book only goes online once it is whole and read by someone else.

Licence and reuse

Two regimes, and they are not to be confused: the text can be reused, the design cannot.

Book content: CC BY 4.0

All the text of the books, their exercises, their worked answers and the open data of this site are published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence. You may copy them, translate them, adapt them, print them, distribute them and sell them, on one condition: credit ODERSA and the address of this site.

That licence is irrevocable. A book published under CC BY 4.0 stays under it, even if the association ceases to exist. That is precisely why it was chosen: money that funds a textbook from this house produces a common good that any organisation can pick up, without asking us.

It is also more permissive than what most open textbook projects settle for. Many add a share-alike clause, which forces republication under the same licence, or a non-commercial clause, which stops a local printer from selling its run. This house adds neither: a school that has two hundred copies printed and sells them at cost is within its rights.

What you may do, and what stays reserved

Allowed, without asking

  • Photocopy a whole book for a class, a workshop, a library.
  • Translate it into a language this house does not publish, and distribute that translation.
  • Take a chapter out of it for a lesson, a handout, a website.
  • Adapt it to a local curriculum, change its examples, cut parts of it.
  • Have it printed and sell it, margin included.
  • Put the file on another site, another platform, another repository.

Reserved, and that is the only limit

  • Reusing the layout, the grid and the typography of the books to publish something else under their appearance.
  • Reusing the visual identity of The Library or of ODERSA, its mark and its drawings.
  • Letting anyone believe that ODERSA wrote, checked or approved an adapted text.
  • Dropping the attribution: crediting ODERSA is the condition, and it is the only one.
The marbled edge of a nineteenth-century book seen from above: irregular veins run across the paper, with the embossed cloth board visible below.
The marbled edge of a volume from 1856. Marbled paper is a craft nobody ever claimed to own: every workshop took up the recipes of the others and altered them. That is exactly the regime this licence puts on the text of these books.Credit

The editorial design: all rights reserved

The layout of the books, their grid, their typography, their visual identity and the design of this site are not openly licensed. They remain the property of ODERSA, all rights reserved.

This is the single exception to everything else being open here, and it is named on purpose rather than left vague. Knowledge should circulate; the design is the work through which it becomes readable, and it is what identifies the house. Taking the text of a textbook and laying it out yourself is expected, and it is even the intended use. Taking the design in order to publish something else under its appearance is not.

In practice the line is easy to hold: take the text, drop it into your own template, and sign the layout with your own name. Nobody has ever needed our grid in order to teach.

How to credit, concretely

Four elements, and the attribution is complete. No more, no less.

  1. The title of the work
    As printed on its title page, in the language of the edition you reused.
  2. The name of the author
    ODERSA. The association is the collective author of what it publishes.
  3. The address of the source
    That of this publishing house, so the reader can find the original.
  4. The licence, and its link
    The CC BY 4.0 notice, with a link to the licence text. If you changed the text, say so: the licence asks that changes be indicated.

The questions the licence raises

I sell printed copies. Is that allowed?

Yes, without permission and without any payment to us. CC BY 4.0 allows commercial use. The association takes no share and asks for nothing.

I want to translate a book into a language you do not publish. Should I tell you?

No, nothing obliges you to. Writing to the publishing team is still worth something: if the translation is complete and has been checked, the association can point to it, and you may spare someone else from doing it again in parallel.

May I remove the parts that do not fit my curriculum?

Yes. The licence allows adaptation. Two duties remain: credit ODERSA, and indicate that the text was modified, so that nobody attributes your cuts to the association.

May I use your layout for my own textbook?

No. The editorial design is the one thing the association keeps, and it is written at the foot of every page on this site. The text is yours, the form is ours.

What happens if ODERSA disappears?

The books stay under CC BY 4.0: the licence is irrevocable, nobody can withdraw it, and any organisation can pick up the catalogue and carry on. That is exactly why it was chosen.

The reference texts

The documents that govern, at their official address. The summary above has no legal force: the licence text does.

  1. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence, human-readable summaryCreative Commons · CC BY 4.0 · checked on August 6, 2026creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0
  2. Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence, full legal textCreative Commons · CC BY 4.0 · checked on August 6, 2026creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode.en

To follow it through