license-analyzer

SPDX license identification using hashes, fingerprints, and semantic similarity.
Supports command-line usage as well as Python module integration.

📦 Installation

pip install license-analyzer

To install from source (e.g., for development):

git clone https://github.com/yourorg/license-analyzer.git
cd license-analyzer
pip install .

🚀 Command-Line Usage

Once installed, the CLI tool is available as:

license-analyzer [OPTIONS] FILE [FILE...]

🔧 Common Options

📄 Examples

Basic usage

license-analyzer LICENSE

Multiple files

license-analyzer license1.txt license2.txt

JSON output with top 3 matches

license-analyzer --format json --top-n 3 LICENSE

Force SPDX update

license-analyzer --update

🐍 Python Module Usage

You can also use license-analyzer directly in your Python code:

from license_analyzer.core import LicenseAnalyzer

analyzer = LicenseAnalyzer()
matches = analyzer.analyze_file("LICENSE")

for match in matches:
    print(match.name, match.score, match.method)

Or, if you want to analyze text (rather than a file):

text = open("LICENSE").read()
matches = analyzer.analyze_text(text)

for match in matches:
    print(match.name, match.score, match.method)

Use top_n=None to get all tied top-scoring matches:

matches = analyzer.analyze_text(text, top_n=None)

📈 Output Format (CLI)

Text (default)

Analysis results for: LICENSE
------------------------------------------------------------
MIT                            score: 1.0000  method: sha256

JSON

{
  "LICENSE": [
    {
      "name": "MIT",
      "score": 1.0,
      "method": "sha256"
    }
  ]
}

CSV

file_path,license_name,score,method
"LICENSE","MIT",1.0,"sha256"

🔄 Updating SPDX License Data

By default, license data is stored under:

~/.cache/license-analyzer/spdx

To update the SPDX license texts (from GitHub):

license-analyzer --update

This refreshes cached licenses and triggers database rebuild if needed.

🧠 Matching Strategies

• ✅ SHA256 Hash Match
• ✅ Canonical Fingerprint Match
• ✅ Semantic Embedding Match (via sentence-transformers)

📝 License

SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0