nuget-license 4.0.10

Nuget License Utility

Nuget License Utility is a tool to analyze, print, and validate the licenses of dependencies in .NET and C++ projects. It supports .NET (Core), .NET Standard, .NET Framework, and native C++ projects.

Features

• Analyze project or solution files for NuGet package licenses
• Validate licenses against an allowed list
• Download license files for auditing
• Supports transitive dependencies, custom mappings, and overrides
• Flexible output: table or JSON (pretty/minified)
• Exclude or ignore specific packages or projects
• Works with .NET Core, .NET Framework, and native C++ projects

Project Structure

This repository provides two main tools:

¹ .NET Framework support via the dotnet tool may vary due to MSBuild/environment differences.

Compatibility Matrix

Installation

NuGetLicenseCore (dotnet tool)

dotnet tool install --global nuget-license

NuGetLicenseFramework.exe

Download the latest release from GitHub Releases and run the executable directly.

Usage

Basic Command

nuget-license [options]

Common Options

Important Notes

Package Detection and Restore

nuget-license does not restore NuGet packages itself. It reads package information from the project.assets.json file (also known as the lock file) that is generated when you run dotnet restore or build your project.

Key points:

• The packages evaluated by nuget-license are always the ones that were used during the last package restore.
• If you use conditional package references (e.g., based on build configuration), only the packages from the last restore will be detected.
• Packages referenced in Directory.Build.props or other MSBuild files with conditions will only appear if they were included in the most recent restore operation.

To ensure all packages are detected:

1. Run dotnet restore (or dotnet build) with the appropriate configuration before running nuget-license:

   dotnet restore -c Release
   nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj
   

2. If you need to analyze packages for different configurations, restore with each configuration separately:

   # For Release configuration
   dotnet restore -c Release
   nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -o JsonPretty -fo licenses-release.json
   
   # For Debug configuration
   dotnet restore -c Debug
   nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -o JsonPretty -fo licenses-debug.json
   

3. If packages are missing from the output, verify that project.assets.json exists in your project's obj folder and that a restore was performed recently.

Examples

Show Help

nuget-license --help

Validate licenses for a project

nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj

Validate licenses for a solution

nuget-license -i MySolution.sln

Use a custom allowed license list

Using a JSON file:

nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -a allowed-licenses.json

Using inline semicolon-separated values:

nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -a "MIT;Apache-2.0;BSD-3-Clause"

Ignore specific packages

Using a JSON file:

nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -ignore ignored-packages.json

Using inline semicolon-separated values (supports wildcards):

nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -ignore "InternalPackage1;InternalPackage2;Test*"

Generate pretty JSON output

nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -o JsonPretty

See docs/output-json.md for detailed information about the JSON output format.

Download all license files

nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -d licenses/

Map license files to license types

nuget-license -i MyProject.csproj -file-mapping license-file-mappings.json

Note: License file paths in the JSON are relative to the JSON file's directory.

Advanced Usage

• Multiple projects: Use -ji with a JSON file listing multiple projects/solutions.
• Override package info: Use -override to supply custom license info for specific packages.
• Ignore packages: Use -ignore to skip in-house or known packages.
• Exclude projects: Use -exclude-projects to skip test or sample projects.

Building from Source

1. Clone the repository.
2. Build with your preferred .NET SDK.
3. For the dotnet tool: dotnet pack NuGetLicenseCore
4. For the framework exe: build NuGetLicenseFramework and use the resulting .exe.

License

See LICENSE for details.

Documentation

For detailed documentation on configuration files and advanced usage, please refer to the documentation files linked above in the GitHub repository. The links point to the documentation that was available at the time this package version was created (commit: 3814b41aa2e1228ba6b4d6a60c1135f6e05684e1).