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Generate reports

All report options belong to the analyze command, and several can be combined in a single run:

ast-metrics analyze --report-html=./report --report-json=./report.json .

Generating everything at once

In a pipeline, use ast-metrics ci instead: it runs the linter, then produces every report in one go.

🌐 HTML report

The HTML report is the one to share with your team. Every page opens on a sentence that states what the analysis found, backed by the few figures that support it:

  • a dashboard, with the distribution of your metrics
  • one page per concern (complexity, coupling, class cohesion, risk, bus factor)
  • a class explorer, sortable and filterable, exposing every computed metric
  • a dependency graph you can search and zoom, which highlights circular dependencies
  • one view per analyzed folder, next to the global and per-language views

To generate a report, run the following command in your terminal:

ast-metrics analyze --report-html=<report-directory> /path/to/your/project

Where <report-directory> is the directory where the report will be saved. Add --open-html to open it in your browser as soon as it is ready.

📄 Markdown report

AST Metrics can also generate Markdown reports. The reports provide an overview of the codebase, in markdown format.

To generate a report, run the following command in your terminal:

ast-metrics analyze --report-markdown=<report-file.md> /path/to/your/project

Where <report-file.md> is the file where the report will be saved.

📄 JSON report

AST Metrics can also generate JSON reports. The reports provide an overview of the codebase, in JSON format.

To generate a report, run the following command in your terminal:

ast-metrics analyze --report-json=<report-file.json> /path/to/your/project

Where <report-file.json> is the file where the report will be saved.

📄 SARIF report

AST Metrics can generate SARIF (Static Analysis Results Interchange Format) reports. SARIF is a standard format for the output of static analysis tools, widely supported by security and code quality platforms like GitHub Advanced Security, Azure DevOps, and many CI/CD tools.

To generate a SARIF report, run the following command in your terminal:

ast-metrics analyze --report-sarif=<report-file.sarif> /path/to/your/project

Where <report-file.sarif> is the file where the report will be saved.

Use --sarif-max-level to cap the severity of the results (error, warning or note). GitHub code scanning fails its own check as soon as a new error alert appears, so keeping the ceiling at warning makes the upload informative rather than blocking.

Use Cases

SARIF reports are particularly useful for:

  • GitHub Code Scanning: Upload SARIF files to GitHub to display code quality issues directly in pull requests
  • CI/CD Integration: Many CI/CD platforms support SARIF for automated code quality checks
  • Security Analysis: SARIF is the standard format for security scanning tools
  • Tool Interoperability: Share analysis results between different static analysis tools

📄 OpenMetrics report (Gitlab CI)

OpenMetrics is a standard for metrics exposition. AST Metrics can generate OpenMetrics reports, which can be easily integrated into your CI/CD pipeline, like GitLab CI.

To generate an OpenMetrics report, run the following command in your terminal:

ast-metrics analyze --report-openmetrics=<report-file.openmetrics> /path/to/your/project

Where <report-file.openmetrics> is the file where the report will be saved.