DependencyFinder

Parse .class files and traverse their structure.

Start with either {@link com.jeantessier.classreader.AggregatingClassfileLoader} or {@link com.jeantessier.classreader.TransientClassfileLoader} to load .class files into memory, and then use {@link com.jeantessier.classreader.Classfile} to traverse the structures.

Use CommandLine to parse and validate command line parameters.

Build forests of packages, classes, and features and their dependencies. Each node can cross-reference other nodes in the forest, according to dependencies within the code.

Here are the core abstractions. At the code are Node and its subclasses. The NodeFactory creates Node instances. The Visitor implementations traverse dependency graphs and perform custom operations. For instance, the GraphSummarizer is used to perform queries and the Printer subclasses do textual rendering.

Visitors

CodeDependencyCollector traverses .class files and builds the dependency graph along the way, using a NodeFactory.

CodeDependencyCollector

Another way to build a dependency graph is to load one that was saved to an XML document. Dependency Finder uses SAX in the form of NodeLoader and NodeHandler. The latter, again, uses a NodeFactory to build the actual in memory representation.

SAX

Is the head of the hierarchy for all user-interface for Dependency Finder.

The classes in these sub-packages serve two purposes:

1. Presentation layer for the application
2. Examples of how to use the libraries that make up Dependency Finder

The first purpose is self-explanatory, but the second one deserves extra attention. The code in each class is meant to provide a one-stop example of how you can build tools using Dependency Finder. As such, I did not try to refactor common code into helper classes or create complex hierarchies. There is a fair bit of duplication and some of the code can be quite unsophisticated. This is done on purpose so that you can study any which one in isolation and understand how you can rool up your own.

Layers

You can think of {@link com.jeantessier.classreader} as a kind of read-only persistence, where we obtain data from compiled Java classes on the filesystem.

The packages {@link com.jeantessier.dependency}, {@link com.jeantessier.diff}, and {@link com.jeantessier.metrics} are where you will find all the logic for dealing with graphs and various results.

The packages {@link com.jeantessier.commandline} and {@link com.jeantessier.text} are utility packages.

Apache Ant task-based tools. These classes are the entry points for using the various tools as part of Ant build files.

Command line interface tools. These classes are the entry points for the scripts of the various tools. Each tool has a -help switch that describes the various options for calling it.

Graphical user interface tools. These classes are the entry points for the scripts of the various tools and their Swing-based utilities. Each tool has a -help switch that describes the various options for calling it.

Compare two groups of classes with each other. The classes in this package compile API differences between the two groups.

Compute various object-oriented metrics from .class classes.

Overall Structure

Measurements Hierarchy