1 #+TITLE: JavaInspect - Utility to visualize java software
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14 - This program is free software: you can redistribute it and/or modify
15 it under the terms of the [[https://www.gnu.org/licenses/lgpl.html][GNU Lesser General Public License]] as
16 published by the Free Software Foundation, either version 3 of the
17 License, or (at your option) any later version.
21 - Homepage: https://svjatoslav.eu
22 - Email: mailto://svjatoslav@svjatoslav.eu
23 - [[https://www.svjatoslav.eu/projects/][Other software projects hosted at svjatoslav.eu]]
26 - GitHub fork for the project:
27 https://github.com/abargnesi/javainspect
30 - [[http://www2.svjatoslav.eu/gitweb/?p=javainspect.git;a=snapshot;h=HEAD;sf=tgz][Download latest snapshot in TAR GZ format]]
32 - [[http://www2.svjatoslav.eu/gitweb/?p=javainspect.git;a=summary][Browse Git repository online]]
34 - Clone Git repository using command:
35 : git clone https://www2.svjatoslav.eu/git/javainspect.git
37 * Goal and operating principle
38 Goal: simplify/speed up understanding the computer program code by
39 automatically visualizing its structure.
41 [[http://www3.svjatoslav.eu/projects/sixth-3d/graphs/][See example produced graphs]] for [[http://www3.svjatoslav.eu/projects/sixth-3d/][Sixth 3D - 3D engine project]].
43 JavaInspect can be used as a [[id:acf1896a-74b4-4914-acf6-a77075e07f25][standalone commandline utility]] as well as
44 [[id:bbeeffc8-3767-440d-8d93-ec9124dd60ee][java library]]. JavaInspect uses primarily Java built-in reflection to
45 discover and visualize any part of Java program.
47 JavaInspect currently has no GUI, configuration files, embedded
48 scripting support, direct Maven or Ant integration. See [[id:2ad2889e-6c95-4662-b3f4-2c341fc74522][usage]] to learn
49 how to instuct Javainspect what to do.
51 After discovering application structure and optionally filtering out
52 unimportant parts, JavaInspect produces GraphViz dot file that
53 describes data to be visualized. Then launches GraphViz to generate
54 bitmap graph in PNG or SVG format.
56 By default on your Desktop directory when operated in library mode or
57 current working directory when operated as standalone commandline
61 + JavaInspect is developed and tested so far only on GNU/Linux.
62 + See: [[https://github.com/pahen/madge][Madge - similar tool for JavaScript]]
65 + A very simple example:
67 [[file:example.png][file:example.resized.png]]
73 + [[http://www3.svjatoslav.eu/projects/sixth-3d/graphs/][See example produced graphs]] for [[http://www3.svjatoslav.eu/projects/sixth-3d/][Sixth 3D - 3D engine project]].
77 :ID: 2ad2889e-6c95-4662-b3f4-2c341fc74522
79 JavaInspect can be controlled in 2 different ways:
80 + [[id:acf1896a-74b4-4914-acf6-a77075e07f25][as standalone commandline utility]]
81 + [[id:bbeeffc8-3767-440d-8d93-ec9124dd60ee][as embedded Java library via Java API]]
83 ** usage as commandline utility
85 :ID: acf1896a-74b4-4914-acf6-a77075e07f25
87 To enable commandline support, (study and) execute script:
88 : commandline launcher/install
90 Warning: It was tested only on Debian Stretch linux.
92 Available commandline arguments:
94 -j (existing files)...
95 JAR file(s) to render.
97 -n (mandatory, string)
107 Hide orphaned classes.
109 -w (one to many strings)...
112 -b (one to many strings)...
115 -d (existingdirectory)
116 Target directory. Default is current directory.
118 -t (options: png, svg)
119 Target image type. Default is: svg.
121 ** usage via Java API
123 :ID: bbeeffc8-3767-440d-8d93-ec9124dd60ee
125 Requires that classes to be visualised are available in the classpath.
127 To get JavaInspect into same classpath with your projecs I so far came
130 1. Add JavaInspect library in your project as a dependency.
132 2. Create new Java project for the purpose visualizing your other
133 projects and include JavaInspect and your projecs binary artifacts
134 (Jar's) into new project classpath. Built binary Jar's (with no
135 source code) are sufficient because JavaInspect operates via
138 Simple Java based control/configuration code needs to be written for
139 each project. I usually put such code into directories devoted for
140 JUnit tests. Because it needs not to be compiled/embedded into final
141 product or project artifact I'm just willing to visualize.
143 Control code in general does the following:
144 1. Create graph object.
145 2. Java reflection/classloaders does not provide mechanism for
146 discovering all classes under given package. Therefore you need to
147 declare at least some classes to be added to the graph by:
148 + Manually adding individual classes to the graph.
149 + and/or: Let GraphViz recursively scan and parse specified
150 directories with Java source code files to discover class names.
151 + For every class added to the graph, GraphViz will recursively
152 inspect it and add all referecned classes to the graph as well.
153 3. Graphs easilly get very big and complex so optionally we filter
154 important code using classname wildcards patterns based blacklist
156 4. Optionally we can tune some rendering parameters like:
157 + Possibility to remove orphaned classes (classes with no
158 references) from the graph.
159 + Specify target directory for generated visualization
160 files. (Default is user desktop directory)
161 + Keep intermediate GraphViz dot file for later inspection.
165 *** example 1: individually picked objects
166 This example demonstrates generating of class graph from hand picked
167 classes and visualizing GraphViz itself.
172 final ClassGraph graph = new ClassGraph();
174 // Add some random object to the graph. GraphViz will detect Class from
178 // Also add some random class to the graph.
179 graph.add(Utils.class);
181 // Keep intermediary GraphViz DOT file for reference.
182 graph.setKeepDotFile(true);
184 // Produce bitmap image titled "JavaInspect.png" to the user Desktop
186 graph.generateGraph("JavaInspect");
190 Note: if desired, more compact version of the above:
192 new ClassGraph().add(randomObject, RandomClass.class)
193 .setKeepDotFile(true).generateGraph("JavaInspect");
198 - Generated DOT file: [[file:JavaInspect.dot][JavaInspect.dot]]
199 - Generated PNG image: [[file:JavaInspect.png][JavaInspect.png]]
201 *** example 2: scan java code, apply filters
204 final ClassGraph graph = new ClassGraph();
206 // Recursively scan current directory for Java source code and attempt
207 // to detect class names from there to be added to the graph.
208 graph.addProject(".");
210 // Blacklist example classes from being shown on the graph
211 graph.blacklistClassPattern("eu.svjatoslav.inspector.java.structure.example.*");
213 // do not show single classes with no relationships on the graph
214 graph.hideOrphanedClasses();
216 // Produce bitmap image titled "JavaInspect full project.png" to the
217 // user Desktop directory.
218 graph.generateGraph("JavaInspect full project");
221 - Generated PNG image: [[file:JavaInspect%20full%20project.png][JavaInspect full project.png]]
223 *** example 3: GraphViz embedded in another project
224 1. Download project Sixth [[http://www2.svjatoslav.eu/gitweb/?p=sixth.git;a=snapshot;h=HEAD;sf=tgz][code snapshot]].
225 2. Inspect and run *DataGraph.java*.
227 *** Embedding JavaInspect in your Maven project
229 Declare JavaInspect as dependency:
234 <groupId>eu.svjatoslav</groupId>
235 <artifactId>javainspect</artifactId>
236 <version>1.6</version>
243 Add Maven repository to retrieve artifact from:
248 <id>svjatoslav.eu</id>
249 <name>Svjatoslav repository</name>
250 <url>http://www2.svjatoslav.eu/maven/</url>
257 [[http://www.graphviz.org/][GraphViz]] - shall be installed on the computer.
259 On Ubuntu/Debian use:
261 sudo apt-get install graphviz
264 Note: Because this is side project (and I have many of them) I can
265 only contribute few hours per year at average. Any help is welcome. A
266 LOT of cool ideas could be implemented. For intstance:
268 - BUG: Should not hide references if there are too many of them to
269 classes if referring classes are not visible anyway because of
270 blacklist/whitelist rules. Basically reference counting should
271 exclude not visible classes.
273 - BUG: Orphaned class removal does not work always. There are many
274 bugs and corner cases to find and fix still.
276 - BUG: Code is not very readable. Document and refactor for better
279 - FEATURE: Create installable DEB package.
280 - Submit it to some Debian developer for integration or become
281 Debian package maintainer.
283 - FEATURE: Make it modular. That is: central part, an application
284 model could be standalone and serializable.
286 - There could be multiple ways to acquire model:
287 - By introspecting application via Java reflections (current mode
289 - By parsing java source. (unfinished)
291 - There could be ways to manipulate model:
292 - Store/load/compare.
293 - Trim uninteresting parts.
294 - Highlight important parts.
296 - There could be multiple ways to render model:
297 - PNG/SVG (currently implemented)
299 - Interactive 3D visualization (TODO)
301 - FEATURE: Replace internal java parser in package
302 eu.svjatoslav.inspector.java.methods with: https://javaparser.org/
304 - FEATURE: Integarte with [[http://plantuml.com/class-diagram][PlantUML]].
306 - FEATURE: Add dark theme for generated graphs.
308 - FEATURE: Sort Class fields by alphabet.
310 - FEATURE: Visualize also concrete field values so it could be used as
311 ultra cool runtime logging/debugging framework.
313 - FEATURE: Possibility to visualize structure and data from JVM
316 - FEATURE: Possibility to attach to remote process to visualize
317 data/structure using JVM debug port and mechanism.
319 - FEATURE: Possibility to attach to JVM using JVM agent.
321 - FEATURE: Possibility to inspect graphs in 3D using [[http://www2.svjatoslav.eu/gitbrowse/sixth-3d/doc/index.html][Sixth 3D engine]].
323 - FEATURE: Possibility to select classes/fields/values to be
324 visualized in some graph query language. For greater flexibility in
325 comparison to currently supported glob syntax.
327 - FEATURE: Add option to control JavaInspect via JSON or XML config
328 file. For example different graphs for given project could be
329 defined once in plain text config, possibly with the aid of some
330 interactive utility. Then defined graphs could be updated as part of
331 project build or release process.
333 - FEATURE: Configurable maven plugin to generate graphs as part of the
334 project build/release process.