NAME

licensecheck - simple license checker for source files

VERSION

Version v3.2.13

SYNOPSIS

licensecheck [ --help | --version ]

licensecheck [ --list-licenses | --list-naming-schemes ]

licensecheck [OPTION...] PATH [PATH...]

DESCRIPTION

licensecheck attempts to determine the license that applies to each file passed to it, by searching the start of the file for text belonging to various licenses.

If any of the arguments passed are directories, licensecheck will add the files contained within to the list of files to process.

When multiple PATHs are provided, only files matching --check and not --ignore are checked.

OPTIONS

Resolving patterns

--shortname-scheme

Since v3.2.

comma-separated priority list of license naming schemes to use for license identifiers (default value: unset (use verbose description))

--list-licenses

Since v3.2.

list identifiers for all detectable licenses and exit

--list-naming-schemes

Since v3.2.

list all available license naming schemes and exit

Selecting files

-c REGEX, --check=REGEX

Since v2.10.10.

regular expression of files to include when more than one PATH is provided (default value: common source files)

-i REGEX, --ignore=REGEX

Since v2.10.10.

regular expression of files to skip when more than one PATH is provided (default value: some backup and VCS files)

-r, --recursive

Since v2.10.7.

traverse directories recursively

Parsing contents

-l N, --lines=N

Since v2.10.3.

number of lines to parse from top of each file; implies optimistic search including only first cluster of detected copyrights or licenses; set to 0 to parse the whole file (and ignore --tail) (default value: 60)

--tail=N

Since v2.15.10.

number of bytes to parse from bottom of each file; set to 0 to avoid parsing from end of file (default value: 5000 (roughly 60 lines))

-e CODEC, --encoding=CODEC

Since v2.15.10.

try decode source files from the specified codec, with iso-8859-1 as fallback (default value: unset (no decoding))

Reporting results

--[no-]verbose

Since v2.10.3.

add header of each file to license information

--copyright

Since v2.10.7.

add copyright statements to license information

-s, --skipped

Since v2.15.10.

print to STDERR files in PATHs matching neither --check nor --ignore

-m, --machine

Since v2.12.2.

print license information as TAB-separated fields, for processing with line-oriented tools like awk and sort (NB! --verbose will kill readability)

--[no-]deb-machine

Since v3.0.0.

print license information like a Debian copyright file; implies --copyright and --shortname-scheme=debian,spdx

--list-delimiter=PRINTF

Since v3.0.18.

printf-string used between multiple plain list items in Debian copyright file (default value: '\n ' (NEWLINE SPACE))

--rfc822-delimiter=PRINTF

Since v3.0.18.

printf-string used between multiple RFC822-style items in Debian copyright file (default value: '\n ' (NEWLINE SPACE SPACE))

--copyright-delimiter=PRINTF

Since v3.0.19.

printf-string used between years and owners in Debian copyright file (default value: ', ' (COMMA SPACE))

--[no-]merge-licenses

Since v3.0.0.

merge same-licensed files in Debian copyright file

General

-h, --help

print help message and exit

-v, --version

print version and copyright information and exit

ENVIRONMENT

NO_COLOR

If defined, will disable color. Consulted before COLOR.

COLOR

Can be set to 0 to explicitly disable colors. The default is to use color when connected to a terminal.

LOG_LEVEL =item QUIET =item VERBOSE =item DEBUG =item TRACE

Used to emit varying details about discoveries to STDERR. See Log::Any::Adapter::Screen for more details.

LOG_PREFIX

The default formatter groks these variables. See formatter in Log::Any::Adapter::Screen for more details.

CAVEATS

The exact output may change between releases, due to the inherently fragile scanning of unstructured data, and the ongoing improvements to detection patterns. For some level of stability, use one of the machine-readable output formats and define a --shortname-scheme.

Option --deb-fmt was deprecated since v3.2. Please use option --shortname-scheme=debian,spdx instead.

SEE ALSO

Other similar tools exist.

Here is a list of known tools also command-line based and general-purpose:

copyright-update

Written in Perl.

debmake

Written in Python.

Specific to Debian packages.

decopy

Written in Python.

Licensee

Written in Ruby.

LicenseFinder

Written in Ruby.

ninka

Written in C++.

Used in FOSSology (along with Monk and Nomos apparently unavailable as standalone command-line tools).

ripper

Written in Go.

scancode-toolkit

Written in Python.

AUTHOR

Jonas Smedegaard <dr@jones.dk>

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

This program is based on the script "licensecheck" from the KDE SDK, originally introduced by Stefan Westerfeld <stefan@space.twc.de>.

Copyright © 2007, 2008 Adam D. Barratt

Copyright © 2012 Francesco Poli

Copyright © 2016-2021 Jonas Smedegaard

Copyright © 2017-2021 Purism SPC

This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU Affero General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU Affero General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU Affero General Public License along with this program. If not, see <https://www.gnu.org/licenses/>.

cpanm App::Licensecheck

perl -MCPAN -e shell
install App::Licensecheck