LicenseGuard Documentation

LicenseGuard is a dependency license analysis tool for Python projects. It reads your requirements.txt, resolves only packages installed in the active environment, classifies license risk, and optionally compares installed metadata against latest PyPI releases.

This documentation is intentionally detailed so teams can use LicenseGuard for local development, CI enforcement, and governance workflows.

Audience

This documentation is written for:

• Python developers integrating dependency compliance checks
• Platform and DevOps engineers building quality gates
• Security and legal-adjacent reviewers who need machine-readable reports

Product summary

LicenseGuard provides:

• Installed-only dependency graph traversal
• Direct vs transitive dependency visibility
• License normalization into SPDX-like identifiers
• Policy-based classification (APPROVED, RESTRICTED, DENIED, UNKNOWN)
• Optional drift analysis against latest PyPI metadata
• CLI output, JSON report output, CSV export, and local dashboard UI

Documentation map

• Getting Started
  Installation, first scan, and basic workflow.
• CLI Reference
  Every option, behavior, and practical command examples.
• Web Dashboard Guide
  UI behavior, scan lifecycle, filtering, and downloads.
• Policy Guide
  Policy file format, evaluation rules, and governance patterns.
• PyPI Drift Analysis
  How compare-latest mode works, fields, and operational guidance.
• Python API Guide
  Programmatic usage and integration examples.
• Architecture and Internals
  Module-level design and execution flow.
• CI/CD Integration
  Pipeline integration strategies and gate patterns.
• Troubleshooting
  Common issues, diagnostics, and resolution steps.
• Docs Preview and GitHub Pages
  Local preview workflows and publishing setup.

Version compatibility

This documentation targets LicenseGuard 0.3.0.

Read this first

If you are new to the project, start here:

1. Getting Started
2. CLI Reference
3. Policy Guide

If you are integrating in CI:

1. CLI Reference
2. CI/CD Integration
3. Troubleshooting

GitHub Pages publishing

To publish docs from this repository:

1. Open repository Settings -> Pages
2. Source: Deploy from a branch
3. Branch: main
4. Folder: /docs
5. Save

GitHub Pages will publish these Markdown files automatically.