AFS and OpenAFS

AFS is a distributed filesystem product, pioneered at Carnegie Mellon University in cooperation with IBM in the mid-1980s, and subsequently supported and developed into a product by The Transarc Corporation (now IBM Pittsburgh Labs).

In November 2000, IBM released a version of the source code of the AFS product to the community for development and maintenance under the IBM Public License (IPL, a license approved by the Open Source Initiative). IBM called this release “OpenAFS”. The OpenAFS code is available to all individuals or organizations free of charge.

While IBM currently owns the trademark and copyrights to “OpenAFS” and “AFS” under the USPTO serial number 73832789, IBM has granted The OpenAFS Foundation a license for its use of the terms in connection with the organization and operation of The Foundation. The OpenAFS Foundation will adopt the IBM Public License terms and conditions, which may change from time to time.