Donationware is a licensing model that supplies fully operational unrestricted software to the user and requests an optional donation be paid to the programmer or a third-party beneficiary (usually anon-profit).[1] The amount of the donation may also be stipulated by the author, or it may be left to the discretion of the user, based on individual perceptions of the software's value. Since donationware comes fully operational (i.e. notcrippleware/freemium) when payment is optional, it is a type offreeware.
An example of donationware is the 1987Atari STvideo gameBallerburg, whose programmer distributed the game for free but asked for a donation, offering as incentive thesource code for the game.[2] Red Ryder was aterminal emulation software program created for theApple Macintosh in the 1980s that used donations to fund development.[citation needed].
