A Simple Yet Powerful Tool for License Header Management: Effortlessly Add, Check, Update, and Remove License Headers

brew tap B1NARY-GR0UP/nwa
brew install nwa

go install github.com/B1NARY-GR0UP/nwa@latest

Check the Used in GitHub Actions section.

Check the Used in pre-commit section.

Check the Docker section.

• Flags: Use flags to customize the behavior of NWA
• DoubleStar(**) Patterns: Use patterns supported by doublestar
• Add: Add license headers to files
• Check: Check license headers of files
• Remove: Remove licenses headers of files
• Update: Update license headers of files
• Config: Edit files according to the configuration file
• Built-in License Header Templates and Custom Templates: Use custom templates
• Used in GitHub Actions: Use NWA in GitHub Actions
• Used in pre-commit: Use NWA in pre-commit
• Docker: Run NWA through docker, for those who do not have a Go environment

Usage:         
  nwa [command]

Common Mode Commands:
  add         add license headers to files
  check       check license headers of files
  remove      remove license headers of files
  update      update license headers of files

Config Mode Commands:
  config      edit the files according to the configuration file

Additional Commands:
  help        Help about any command

Flags:
  -h, --help      help for nwa
  -v, --version   version for nwa

Use "nwa [command] --help" for more information about a command.

• Basic

• Advanced

Both --skip (-s) and the working path support patterns recognized by doublestar.

However, some shells may interpret these patterns (e.g. **), which could cause NWA to behave unexpectedly.

The best way to resolve this issue is to wrap your paths in double quotes ("").

Additionally, since Windows uses a different path separator (\) compared to Linux and macOS, NWA internally converts \ to / when traversing files to match doublestar patterns. Therefore, make sure to use / as the path separator in both --skip (-s) and the working path.

NOTE: Since NWA always operates from the current directory (.), parent directories are not visible to NWA. Make sure not to use paths like ../path/to/file.

nwa add [flags] path...

nwa add -l apache -c "RHINE LAB.LLC." -y 2077 "src/**/*.go" "pkg/pool/**"

nwa check [flags] path...

nwa check --copyright "BINARY Members" --license apache --fuzzy "**/*.py"

2024/11/24 19:24:29 WARN file does not have a matched header path=dirB\dirC\fileC.go
2024/11/24 19:24:29 WARN file does not have a matched header path=main.go
[NWA SUMMARY] scanned=4 matched=2 mismatched=2 skipped=1 failed=0

2024/11/24 19:24:35 INFO skip file path=README.md
2024/11/24 19:24:35 INFO file has a matched header path=dirA\fileA.go
2024/11/24 19:24:35 WARN file does not have a matched header path=dirB\dirC\fileC.go
2024/11/24 19:24:35 WARN file does not have a matched header path=main.go
2024/11/24 19:24:35 INFO file has a matched header path=dirB\fileB.go
[NWA SUMMARY] scanned=4 matched=2 mismatched=2 skipped=1 failed=0

nwa remove [flags] path...

nwa remove -l mit -c "RHINE LAB.LLC." -s "src/vender/**" "src/**"

nwa update [flags] path...

nwa update -l apache -c "BINARY Members" -s "dirA/**" -s "dirB/**/*.py" "**"

• Flags

NOTE: If some configuration is not configured, the default configuration will be used.

• Usage

nwa config [flags] [path]

NOTE: Path is the configuration file path. If not specified, .nwa-config.yaml will be used as the default configuration file path.

• Example

nwa config -c check

The command in the example above reads the .nwa-config.yaml configuration file in the current directory and checks whether the license headers of the specified files meet the requirements based on its content.

The structure of the configuration file will be provided below.

• Sample Configuration file

nwa:
  # basic
  cmd: "add"                        # Default: "add"; Can be overwritten by --command (-c) flag; Optional: "add", "check", "remove", "update"
  holder: "RHINE LAB.LLC."          # Default: "<COPYRIGHT HOLDER>"
  year: "2077"                      # Default: Current Year
  license: "apache"                 # Default: "apache"
  spdxids: ""                       # Default: ""
  skip:                             # Default: []
    - "**.py"
  path:                             # Default: []
    - "src/**/*.go"
    - "example/**/*.go"
  # advanced
  mute: false                       # Default: false (unspecified)
  verbose: false                    # Default: false (unspecified)
  fuzzy: false                      # Default: false (unspecified); Used for "check" and "remove" commands
  tmpltype: ""                      # Default: ""; Optional: "live", "static", "raw"
  tmpl: ""                          # Default: ""                                                       
  keyword: []                       # Default: []; Used for "add" and "update" commands
  style: []                         # Default: []

• Built-in License Header Templates

• Custom Templates

NOTE: When using a custom template, you must specify both the template type and the template itself (use a file path in common mode, and template content in config mode).

nwa config -c check

nwa:
  holder: BINARY Members
  tmpltype: live
  tmpl: |
    Copyright {{ .Year }} {{ .Holder }}

    Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
    you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
    You may obtain a copy of the License at

        http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

    Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
    distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
    WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
    See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
    limitations under the License.
  skip:
    - "testdata/**"
  path:
    - "**/*.go"

nwa add -T static -t mytmpl.txt "**/*.py"

Copyright 2077 RHINE LAB.LLC.

Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
You may obtain a copy of the License at

    http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0

Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
limitations under the License.

nwa add -T raw -t myrawtmpl.txt "**/*.java"

// Copyright 2077 RHINE LAB.LLC.
// 
// Licensed under the Apache License, Version 2.0 (the "License");
// you may not use this file except in compliance with the License.
// You may obtain a copy of the License at
// 
//     http://www.apache.org/licenses/LICENSE-2.0
// 
// Unless required by applicable law or agreed to in writing, software
// distributed under the License is distributed on an "AS IS" BASIS,
// WITHOUT WARRANTIES OR CONDITIONS OF ANY KIND, either express or implied.
// See the License for the specific language governing permissions and
// limitations under the License.

For the configuration file example, please refer to the Config section.

- name: License Header Check
  uses: B1NARY-GR0UP/nwa@main
  with:
    version: latest        # (optional) version of nwa to use; default: latest
    cmd: check             # (optional) command to execute; options: `check`, `add`, `update`, `remove`; default: check
    path: .nwa-config.yaml # (optional) configuration file path; default: .nwa-config.yaml

When there are mismatched or failed entries in the result of nwa execution, nwa will return a non-zero exit code, causing the CI to fail.

You may refer to the other commands or flags introduced in the Usage section for optimization.

• Example

name: License Header Check

on:
  push:
    branches: [ "main" ]
  pull_request:
    branches: [ "main" ]

jobs:
  build:
    runs-on: ubuntu-latest
    steps:
      - uses: actions/checkout@v4

      - name: Set up Go
        uses: actions/setup-go@v5
        with:
          go-version: 1.23

      - name: Install NWA
        run: go install github.com/B1NARY-GR0UP/nwa@latest

      - name: Run License Header Check
        run: nwa check -c "BINARY Members" -f -l apache "**/*.go"

Thanks to the support of the pre-commit tool, NWA can be used as a pre-commit hook.

Currently, NWA offers two hooks, nwa-check and nwa, as specified in .pre-commit-hooks.yaml. You can use them by configuring the .pre-commit-config.yaml file in your Git repository.

Below are examples of .pre-commit-config.yaml file using the nwa-check and nwa hooks, which you can modify according to your needs:

NOTE: A Golang runtime environment is required.

• License Header Check Example

repos:
  -   repo: https://github.com/B1NARY-GR0UP/nwa
      rev: [version tag]
      hooks:
        -   id: nwa-check
            args: ["-c", "BINARY Members", "-f", "-l", "apache"]

• License Header Add Example

NOTE: pre-commit considers a hook to have failed if it modifies any files. Therefore, after using add, update, or remove, you may need to run git add again and commit the updated files.

repos:
  -   repo: https://github.com/B1NARY-GR0UP/nwa
      rev: [version tag]
      hooks:
        -   id: nwa
            args: ["add", "-c", "BINARY Members", "-l", "apache"]

• main: Created/updated on every push to the main branch.
• latest: Created/updated only when pushing version tags.
• version tags (e.g., 0.1.3): Created once per version tag push and preserved permanently.

• Install

Install the nwa docker image directly:

docker pull ghcr.io/b1nary-gr0up/nwa:lastest

OR

Build it from source:

docker build -t ghcr.io/b1nary-gr0up/nwa:main .

• Verify if it can work correctly

docker run -it ghcr.io/b1nary-gr0up/nwa:main --version

• Mount the directory you want NWA to work with to /src and use the commands mentions in usage

docker run -it -v ${PWD}:/src ghcr.io/b1nary-gr0up/nwa:main add -c "RHINE LAB.LLC." -y 2077 "**"

• Add License Headers to Your Code Files

Sincere appreciation to the following repositories that made the development of NWA possible.

• addlicense
• cobra
• doublestar
• viper

NWA is distributed under the Apache License 2.0. The licenses of third party dependencies of NWA are explained here.

NWA is a Subproject of the Basic Middleware Service