License Tool: repository license maintenance
Audit, check and apply repository license headers while preserving language-specific preambles and making policy choices inspectable.
in progress
License metadata is easy to let drift across a growing set of repositories. A header can become outdated, a dependency can introduce a different license, and an automated rewrite can conceal an assumption. License Tool makes those facts inspectable before changing files.
CTO to Human: inspect the policy before applying it
The tool separates an audit from an application step. An audit reports the current situation; a check can gate CI; an apply operation proposes a canonical header. License choice, holder, year policy and header style are configuration inputs.
That distinction keeps an engineering convenience from silently becoming a licensing decision. A useful report identifies the file, license and violated policy so the responsible person can assess the result.
Engineer to Engineer: structured evidence and explicit writes
The Go CLI supports text, Markdown and JSON reports, source/dependency inspection and policy-aware rollups. Header application is a dry run unless explicitly written. Top-level license files use a vendored SPDX license-list snapshot rather than invented license text.
The documented grouping and filtering behavior preserves complete machine-readable findings, even when a human report is summarized. Unknown metadata remains visible rather than disappearing inside a favorable percentage. That makes the output suitable for agents and CI while retaining evidence a reviewer can inspect.
The source repository contains the command contract and policy configuration. This project journal follows implementation and adoption; automated classification remains an input to licensing review, not a promise that a repository’s legal obligations are resolved.