Licensing

Helctic is distributed under the AWFixer Source Available License v0.4 (ASAL). It is source-available, not open source: you can read, run, and modify the code under the conditions below, but some uses require a commercial license.

Not legal advice

This page is a plain-language summary for convenience only. The full LICENSE.md is the binding text. If the two disagree, the license file governs.

What you can do

• View and evaluate the source.
• Run the software for internal purposes.
• Modify it for internal purposes.
• Academic / security research that is non-commercial and not aimed at a competing product.

Personal & small-entity grace

Individuals and small entities — ≤ 10 employees or < $2M USD annual revenue — may use, modify, and run Helctic for personal, educational, or internal business purposes, including limited production use, as long as you don't build or operate a competing offering.

If a small entity grows past those thresholds, there's a 180-day grace period to obtain a commercial license or wind down restricted use.

What requires a commercial license

Without a separate written commercial license from the Licensor, you may not:

• Build, operate, or enable a Competitive Offering (anything providing materially the same functionality — SaaS, on-prem, SDK, agent, API, …).
• Create Functionally Equivalent software using Helctic as a reference for its interfaces, schemas, behaviors, or system-call semantics.
• Publish benchmarks or competitive comparisons without prior written consent.

AI / ML restrictions

Prohibited AI Use is not permitted without a commercial license. This includes, non-exhaustively:

• Training or fine-tuning any AI system on the Software.
• Building embeddings / vector indexes / RAG over the Software where the purpose overlaps with a competing offering.
• Distilling interfaces or behaviors from the Software into an AI system.

Narrow exception: ephemeral AI assistance (e.g. autocomplete on code you authored) is allowed only when no more than strictly necessary snippets are shared with the model. See §4 of the license for exact terms.

Change date

Each released version becomes more permissively available four (4) years after it is first published under this license (the "Change Date"). See the license text for specifics.

Clean-room development

Independent, good-faith development of similar functionality that does not rely on the Software, knowledge directly derived from it, or prohibited AI use is not restricted by this license.

Need a commercial license?

If your intended use falls outside the grants above — larger organizations, competitive products, AI training, or redistribution — see Pricing or contact oss@awfixer.me.