A powerful Chrome extension that automatically detects open-source libraries and their licenses on web pages, helping developers identify potential license compatibility issues before they become legal problems.
Developer License Detector scans web pages to identify JavaScript libraries, CSS frameworks, and other open-source components, then analyzes their licenses for compatibility with your project's license. This helps developers:
- Prevent License Violations: Identify incompatible licenses before integrating code
- Ensure Compliance: Stay compliant with open-source licensing requirements
- Save Time: Automatically detect libraries without manual inspection
- Make Informed Decisions: Understand licensing implications of your dependencies
- Script Tag Analysis: Detects libraries from
<script>tags with URL pattern matching - Global Object Detection: Identifies libraries through their global JavaScript objects
- Link Tag Analysis: Detects CSS frameworks and stylesheets
- Font Library Detection: Identifies web font services (Google Fonts, etc.)
- SPDX Compliance: Uses official SPDX license identifiers
- Compatibility Checking: Analyzes license compatibility with your project
- Risk Assessment: Categorizes compatibility as compatible, incompatible, or unknown
- Detailed Explanations: Provides context for each compatibility decision
- Clean, Modern Design: Intuitive popup interface
- Real-time Analysis: Instant results on any web page
- Filtering Options: View all libraries, or filter by compatibility status
- Detailed Information: Version numbers, license info, and detection methods
- Statistics Dashboard: Overview of detected libraries and compatibility status
- Project License Selection: Configure your project's license for accurate analysis
- Persistent Settings: Settings saved across browser sessions
- Export Capabilities: Export detection results for documentation
- Visit the Chrome Web Store listing (coming soon)
- Click "Add to Chrome"
- Confirm the installation
- Download or clone this repository:
git clone https://github.com/mustafaer/developer-license-detector.git
- Open Chrome and navigate to
chrome://extensions/ - Enable "Developer mode" (toggle in top right)
- Click "Load unpacked"
- Select the
developer-license-detectordirectory - The extension icon will appear in your toolbar
To create a distributable package:
# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/mustafaer/developer-license-detector.git
cd developer-license-detector
# Make the build script executable
chmod +x build.sh
# Build the extension
./build.sh
# Or using npm
npm run buildThe packaged extension will be in build/dist/ as a zip file, ready for Chrome Web Store upload. See BUILD.md for detailed build options and instructions.
- Navigate to any web page you want to analyze
- Click the extension icon in your Chrome toolbar
- View detected libraries and their licenses
- Select your project's license from the dropdown (defaults to MIT)
- Review compatibility analysis and risk assessments
- Filter results by compatibility status if needed
- Build Guide: How to build and package the extension
- Contributing Guide: How to contribute to the project
- Installation Guide: Detailed installation instructions
- Troubleshooting: Common issues and solutions
- Privacy Policy: Privacy policy and data handling
-
Detection Phase: When you click the extension icon, multiple detection strategies scan the page:
- Script tags are analyzed for CDN URLs and known patterns
- Global JavaScript objects are inspected for library signatures
- Link tags are checked for CSS frameworks
- Font services are identified from stylesheet URLs
-
Enhancement Phase: Detected libraries are matched against a database of known libraries:
- Official names and versions are retrieved
- Homepage and repository URLs are added
- License information is fetched from SPDX database
-
Analysis Phase: License compatibility is evaluated:
- Your project's license is compared against each dependency
- Compatibility matrix determines if licenses are compatible
- Risk levels are assigned (compatible, incompatible, unknown)
- Detailed explanations are generated
-
Display Phase: Results are presented in an organized interface:
- Libraries grouped by detection method
- Color-coded compatibility indicators
- Detailed metadata and links
- Summary statistics
The extension can detect 100+ popular libraries including:
- React, Vue, Angular, Svelte
- jQuery, Lodash, Underscore
- D3.js, Chart.js, Three.js
- Axios, Moment.js, Date-fns
- And many more...
- Bootstrap, Tailwind CSS
- Material Design, Bulma
- Foundation, Semantic UI
- Google Fonts
- Adobe Fonts
- Font Awesome
See data/known-libraries.json for the complete list.
The extension uses a comprehensive compatibility matrix based on:
- SPDX License List: Official standardized license identifiers
- FSF Compatibility Guidelines: Free Software Foundation recommendations
- OSI Recommendations: Open Source Initiative guidance
- Legal Precedents: Established compatibility interpretations
- Permissive: MIT, Apache-2.0, BSD licenses
- Copyleft: GPL family, LGPL, AGPL
- Weak Copyleft: MPL-2.0, EPL-2.0
- Public Domain: Unlicense, CC0-1.0
- And more...
We welcome contributions! Please see our Contributing Guide for details on:
- Reporting bugs
- Suggesting features
- Submitting pull requests
- Code style guidelines
- Development setup
- Chrome browser (version 88 or higher)
- Basic knowledge of JavaScript and Chrome Extension APIs
- Git for version control
# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/mustafaer/developer-license-detector.git
cd developer-license-detector
# Load extension in Chrome (see Installation section above)
# Make changes to the code
# Reload extension in chrome://extensions/developer-license-detector/
├── analyzers/ # License compatibility analysis
├── background/ # Service worker for background tasks
├── content/ # Content scripts injected into pages
├── data/ # JSON databases and configuration
├── detectors/ # Library detection strategies
├── icons/ # Extension icons
├── popup/ # User interface (HTML, CSS, JS)
└── utils/ # Helper utilities
# Run basic tests
npm test
# Manual testing
# 1. Load extension in Chrome
# 2. Visit test page: test-page.html
# 3. Click extension icon
# 4. Verify detections- Some obfuscated or bundled libraries may not be detected
- License information depends on external APIs (requires internet)
- Chrome internal pages (chrome://, chrome-extension://) cannot be analyzed
- Some dynamically loaded libraries may require page refresh
See TROUBLESHOOTING.md for solutions to common problems.
- Firefox support
- Detection of npm/yarn lock files
- Package.json analysis for Node.js projects
- Improved version detection accuracy
- Custom license compatibility rules
- Export reports (PDF, CSV, JSON)
- GitHub integration
- License change notifications
- Historical tracking
- Issues: GitHub Issues
- Discussions: GitHub Discussions
- Email: mustafaerpro@gmail.com
This project is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 - see the LICENSE file for details.
We chose GPL-3.0 to ensure that:
- The software remains free and open source
- Modifications and derivatives are also open source
- Users have the freedom to study, modify, and distribute the code
- The community can benefit from improvements
- SPDX: For maintaining the standardized license list
- Open Source Initiative: For license compatibility guidance
- Contributors: Everyone who has contributed to this project
- Community: All users who report issues and provide feedback
If you find this extension useful, please:
- ⭐ Star this repository
- 🐛 Report bugs and issues
- 💡 Suggest new features
- 🔀 Submit pull requests
- 📢 Share with other developers
Made with ❤️ by Mustafa ER
Helping developers navigate the complex world of open-source licensing, one web page at a time.