CI/CD Integration

Use LicenseGuard in pipelines to prevent risky dependencies from entering protected branches.

Basic pipeline pattern

- run: pip install -r requirements.txt .
- run: licenseguard scan requirements.txt --cli --policy policy.yaml --fail-on restricted

Recommended steps

1. Install app dependencies and LicenseGuard in same environment
2. Run scan in CLI mode
3. Fail build based on selected threshold
4. Store JSON report as CI artifact

Reference GitHub Actions workflow

name: dependency-license-check
on:
  pull_request:
  push:
    branches: [main]

jobs:
  licenseguard:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4
      - uses: actions/setup-python@v5
        with:
          python-version: "3.11"
      - run: pip install -r requirements.txt .
      - run: licenseguard scan requirements.txt --cli --json-only -o licenseguard-report.json --fail-on restricted
      - uses: actions/upload-artifact@v4
        with:
          name: licenseguard-report
          path: licenseguard-report.json

JSON artifact example

licenseguard scan requirements.txt --cli --json-only -o artifacts/licenseguard-report.json

Choosing failure threshold

• denied -> least strict
• restricted -> common governance baseline
• unknown -> strictest safety posture

Caching in CI for drift mode

If using --check-latest, provide --cache-file and persist it between jobs to reduce API usage and improve speed.

Pull request workflows

Suggested checks:

• Run scan on every PR
• Comment summary counts in PR checks
• Block merge on policy threshold violation

Policy maintenance in CI

• Keep policy file in repository root (for discoverability)
• Require code-owner review for policy changes
• Add a scheduled workflow to run drift mode weekly