ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.md

aid: acknowledgments-md
url: https://raw.githubusercontent.com/api-evangelist/acknowledgments-md/refs/heads/main/apis.yml
name: ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.md
x-type: convention
type: Index
deliveryModel:
  model: unknown
  open_source: false
  commercial: false
  callable_host: false
  label: Delivery model not determined — needs a product licence on record
  confidence: low
  source:
  - none
  generated: '2026-08-28'
  method: derived
accessModel:
  pricing: unknown
  onboarding: unknown
  trial: false
  try_now: false
  public: false
  label: Unknown
  confidence: low
  source: []
  generated: '2026-07-22'
  method: derived
image: https://kinlane-images.s3.amazonaws.com/shared/apis-json/icons/acknowledgments-md.png
tags:
- Attribution
- Documentation
- Licensing
- Open-Source
- Repository
- Standards
tags_raw:
- Attribution
- Documentation
- Licensing
- Open Source
- Repository
- Standards
description: ACKNOWLEDGMENTS.md is a standardized file convention used in open source repositories to credit third-party software,
  libraries, inspirations, and other works that a project builds upon or is indebted to. It is a common practice for documenting
  attribution and provenance, complementing LICENSE, README, CONTRIBUTING, and CODE_OF_CONDUCT files as part of a healthy
  open source project structure. The file typically lists dependencies, their copyright holders, and the licenses under which
  they are distributed.
created: '2025-01-01'
modified: '2026-04-19'
specificationVersion: '0.23'
apis: []
common:
- type: Documentation
  url: https://docs.github.com/en/repositories/managing-your-repositorys-settings-and-features/customizing-your-repository/licensing-a-repository
  name: GitHub Repository Licensing Guide
- type: GettingStarted
  url: https://contributing.md/
  name: CONTRIBUTING.md Open Source Guides
- type: Features
  data:
  - name: Attribution Documentation
    description: Provides a standardized location to document all third-party libraries, frameworks, and tools used in a project,
      along with their copyright holders and licenses.
  - name: License Compliance
    description: Helps projects maintain compliance with open source licenses that require attribution, such as MIT, BSD,
      Apache 2.0, and Creative Commons.
  - name: Contributor Recognition
    description: Acknowledges individuals and organizations that contributed to the project, beyond the primary maintainers
      listed in other files.
  - name: Provenance Tracking
    description: Documents the origins of code, designs, or concepts that influenced the project, providing clear provenance
      for legal and audit purposes.
- type: UseCases
  data:
  - name: Open Source Projects
    description: Used in open source repositories to document all third-party dependencies, their licenses, and copyright
      notices for compliance.
  - name: Corporate Software Releases
    description: Required by many corporate open source release policies to document all third-party components before releasing
      software publicly.
  - name: Academic and Research Projects
    description: Used in academic repositories to cite datasets, tools, and prior work that the research builds upon.
  - name: Documentation Projects
    description: Applied to documentation repositories to credit sources, frameworks, and tools used to generate or host the
      documentation.
maintainers:
- FN: Kin Lane
  email: kin@apievangelist.com