use-license

Yet another take at a license downloader.

npx use-license

License data is guaranteed to be up to date as license list and text are fetched directly from SPDX.

Usage

To choose a license:

npx use-license

This will show a list of all SPDX licences that are certified by the OSI or the FSF for selection. After selection it'll write the license text into ./LICENSE.

Some licenses have fields to fill out. use-license has not implemented this functionality — the user is expected to fill it out themself.

To skip the prompt:

npx use-license MIT # or any SPDX identifier

This will download the MIT license into the ./LICENSE file.

Full usage

# Show help
npx use-license --help

# List all open source licenses in the SPDX license list
npx use-license --list

# List all licenses in the SPDX license list, including nonfree licenses
# (licenses not certified by the OSI or FSF)
npx use-license --list --all

# Select a license to open in browser
npx use-license --open
# Open license whose id is <ID> in browser
npx use-license --open "<ID>"
# --open is just a boolean flag
npx use-license "<ID>" --open

# Select a license to download
npx use-license
# Select a license to download; also show nonfree licenses as candidates
npx use-license --all
# Download the license whose id is <ID>
npx use-license "<ID>"
# Always overwrite ./LICENSE instead of asking when it exists
npx use-license --force

Thanks

• Inspiration: npm:gitignore by msfeldstein, npm:license by Ovyerus
• spdx's license-list-data and SPDX in general

Prior art

• npm:license by Ovyerus
  • Has some extra stuff around filling out license templates.
    • use-license instead just throws the license text into ./LICENSE, and you are always expected to fill it out manually.
  • Seems like it does extra text wrapping
  • Relies on a fork of spdx-license-list, both of which require periodic updates
    • use-license fetches directly from spdx/license-list-data, therefore needs internet access but will always be up to date