So you're looking for places to mirror your code? The obvious one would be Github; another one BerliOS (they take FOSS projects only though). That's for development; if you're doing actual releases then you might want to put them in other places too, like archive.org, or - wild idea - right here.

Btw - IANAL, but I as far as I understand it you do need to specify a license for your code, since otherwise it'll be technically available but legally impossible to use by others.

I want people to use this program all they want but just want people to acknowledge me if they publish the source code or use such in their programs. How do I copyright something?

General overview of FOSS licenses; someone asking about attribution. Lots of legalese, obviously, but unfortunately there's no way around that. (Unless you want to put something in the public domain, in which case you can just state that you're doing just that - but then there's not gonna be any mandatory attribution.)

I thank you. Now, how do I copy-protect my code? Most of my projects don't need copy protection; I just want to be credited if people use my ideas, that's all.

I'm fine with the code at my current site, but I want to upload my packages to other sites, so I can get more exposure. 😀

Harry Potter wrote on 2023-05-17, 13:51:

I thank you. Now, how do I copy-protect my code? Most of my projects don't need copy protection; I just want to be credited if people use my ideas, that's all.

What do you mean by copy-protect? Arguably, the only code that is copy-protected is firmware inside an IC which can't be read out without decapping the chip. In general, whenever code is loaded into memory in order to execute it, this is (per US law) considered making a copy, which is why you need to agree to a license to run most software.

I'm sorry. I meant copyright. BTW, is it okay if I SPAM here about something once or twice?

Somewhere in your source/documentation/UI you write "Copyright" along with your name or legal entity, and optionally a year or range of years when this work was created/published. Then you'll want to specify the license(s) covering the software or perhaps you'll want to specify "All rights reserved."

(I am not a lawyer)

Thank you. Do I need to register the program?

no, adding Copyright 1992-2023 - {real legal name} is all you need. fake name wont stand up to any real scrutinity if you ever hope to enforce the copyright or file claims etc.

and if you want it to be opernsource, drop the the license file into directory.

ie: here is my roguelike I just released a few months back for linux/dos/winxp/win10. it has the LICENSE file in it for bsd 3 clause, its also doubled up because github also know its bsd 3 clause

https://github.com/stu/UnderDark

Okay. Thank you. 😀