Google’s Open Source Insights Visualizes Package Dependencies

Google has announced Open Source Insights, an experimental visualization tool that graphs the dependencies of open source projects.

According to the announcement, Open Source Insights shows you dependency information for a package before you even install the package. “You can see instantly what installing a package—or an updated version—might mean for your project, how popular it is, find links to source code and other information, and then decide whether it should be installed.”

Open Source Insights creates a dependency graph for a given package, then allows you to isolate the path to a particular dependency, the website says. You can also “compare two versions of a package to see how the dependencies have changed in a new release.”

The tool “continuously scans millions of projects in the open source software ecosystem, gathering information about packages, including licensing, ownership, security issues, and other metadata” to help you make informed decisions about building and using open source software.
 

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