Showing Nuget Dependency Graph
In .NET Framework and .NET solutions, Nugets are added to solutions to conveniently add libraries. Each project got possibly multiple Nuget package dependencies. Each Nuget package itself can reference other Nuget libraries, which again references again additional libraries and so on. An overview of all the Nuget libraries actually used by a project, those that can be called top-level and transitive dependencies. Transitive dependencies are those indirectly references by the top-level dependencies. Do not confused this with those libraries that are actually referenced in the project file (.csproj files for example) as a Package Reference directly with those called top-level dependencies in this article, top-level here means the Nuget is has got a dependency graph level depth of one, compared to transitive dependencies where the dependency graph level higher than one.
function Show-NugetDependencyGraph {
[CmdletBinding()]
param ()
$tempHtmlPath = [System.IO.Path]::GetTempFileName() + ".html"
$assetFiles = Get-ChildItem -Recurse -Filter "project.assets.json"
$currentProjects = (gci -recurse -filter *.csproj | select-object -expandproperty name) -join ',' #get folder name to show
$script:mermaidGraph = @"
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<script type="module">
import mermaid from 'https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/mermaid@10/dist/mermaid.esm.min.mjs';
mermaid.initialize({ startOnLoad: true });
</script>
<style>
body {
font-family: sans-serif;
padding: 20px;
}
.mermaid {
background: #f9f9f9;
padding: 20px;
border-radius: 8px;
min-height: 800px;
overflow: hidden;
}
.mermaid svg {
min-height: 800px;
width: 100%;
height: auto;
}
</style>
</head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<body>
<h2>Nuget Dependency Graph for '$currentProjects' (Max Depth: 3)</h2>
<div class="mermaid">
graph TD
"@
$visited = @{}
$nodes = @{}
$edges = @{}
$topLevelDeps = @{}
$transitiveDeps = @{}
function Escape-MermaidLabel {
param ([string]$text)
$text = $text -replace '\(', '('
$text = $text -replace '\)', ')'
$text = $text -replace '\[', '['
$text = $text -replace '\]', ']'
$text = $text -replace ',', ','
return $text
}
function Normalize-NodeId {
param ([string]$text)
return ($text -replace '[^a-zA-Z0-9_]', '_')
}
function Add-Dependencies {
param (
[string]$pkgName,
[object]$targets,
[int]$depth,
[string]$path = ""
)
if ($depth -gt 3 -or $visited.ContainsKey($pkgName)) { return }
$visited[$pkgName] = $true
$pkgVersion = $pkgName.Split('/')[1]
$pkgId = $pkgName.Split('/')[0]
$escapedVersion = Escape-MermaidLabel($pkgVersion)
$nodeId = Normalize-NodeId ("{0}_{1}" -f $pkgId, $pkgVersion)
$nodeLabel = "$nodeId[""$pkgId<br/>v$escapedVersion""]:::level$depth"
if (-not $nodes.ContainsKey($nodeId)) {
$script:mermaidGraph += "$nodeLabel`n"
$nodes[$nodeId] = $true
}
$currentPath = if ($path) { "$path → $pkgId ($pkgVersion)" } else { "$pkgId ($pkgVersion)" }
if ($depth -eq 1) {
$topLevelDeps["$pkgId/$pkgVersion"] = $currentPath
} else {
$transitiveDeps["$pkgId/$pkgVersion"] = $currentPath
}
foreach ($target in $targets.PSObject.Properties) {
$pkg = $target.Value.$pkgName
if ($pkg -and $pkg.dependencies) {
foreach ($dep in $pkg.dependencies.PSObject.Properties) {
$depName = $dep.Name
$depVersion = $dep.Value
$escapedDepVersion = Escape-MermaidLabel($depVersion)
$depNodeId = Normalize-NodeId ("{0}_{1}" -f $depName, $depVersion)
$depNodeLabel = "$depNodeId[""$depName<br/>v$escapedDepVersion""]:::level$($depth+1)"
if (-not $nodes.ContainsKey($depNodeId)) {
$script:mermaidGraph += "$depNodeLabel`n"
$nodes[$depNodeId] = $true
}
$edge = "$nodeId --> $depNodeId"
if (-not $edges.ContainsKey($edge)) {
$script:mermaidGraph += "$edge`n"
$edges[$edge] = $true
}
Add-Dependencies ("$depName/$depVersion") $targets ($depth + 1) $currentPath
}
}
}
}
foreach ($file in $assetFiles) {
$json = Get-Content $file.FullName | ConvertFrom-Json
$targets = $json.targets
foreach ($target in $targets.PSObject.Properties) {
$targetPackages = $target.Value
foreach ($package in $targetPackages.PSObject.Properties) {
Add-Dependencies $package.Name $targets 1
}
}
}
$topLevelDepsCount = $topLevelDeps.Count #number of top level dependencies
$transitiveDepsCount = $transitiveDeps.Count #number of top level transitive dependencies
$script:mermaidGraph += @"
classDef level1 fill:#cce5ff,stroke:#004085,stroke-width:2px;
classDef level2 fill:#d4edda,stroke:#155724,stroke-width:1.5px;
classDef level3 fill:#fff3cd,stroke:#856404,stroke-width:1px;
</div>
<script>
function enablePanZoom(svg) {
let isPanning = false;
let startX, startY;
let viewBox = svg.viewBox.baseVal;
let zoomFactor = 1.1;
// Initial zoom: scale to 200%
const initialZoom = 2.0;
const newWidth = viewBox.width / initialZoom;
const newHeight = viewBox.height / initialZoom;
viewBox.x += (viewBox.width - newWidth) / 2;
viewBox.y += (viewBox.height - newHeight) / 2;
viewBox.width = newWidth;
viewBox.height = newHeight;
svg.addEventListener("mousedown", (e) => {
isPanning = true;
startX = e.clientX;
startY = e.clientY;
svg.style.cursor = "grabbing";
});
svg.addEventListener("mousemove", (e) => {
if (!isPanning) return;
const dx = (e.clientX - startX) * (viewBox.width / svg.clientWidth);
const dy = (e.clientY - startY) * (viewBox.height / svg.clientHeight);
viewBox.x -= dx;
viewBox.y -= dy;
startX = e.clientX;
startY = e.clientY;
});
svg.addEventListener("mouseup", () => {
isPanning = false;
svg.style.cursor = "grab";
});
svg.addEventListener("mouseleave", () => {
isPanning = false;
svg.style.cursor = "grab";
});
svg.addEventListener("wheel", (e) => {
e.preventDefault();
const { x, y, width, height } = viewBox;
const mx = e.offsetX / svg.clientWidth;
const my = e.offsetY / svg.clientHeight;
const zoom = e.deltaY < 0 ? 1 / zoomFactor : zoomFactor;
const newWidth = width * zoom;
const newHeight = height * zoom;
viewBox.x += (width - newWidth) * mx;
viewBox.y += (height - newHeight) * my;
viewBox.width = newWidth;
viewBox.height = newHeight;
});
svg.style.cursor = "grab";
}
document.addEventListener("DOMContentLoaded", () => {
setTimeout(() => {
const svg = document.querySelector(".mermaid svg");
if (svg) {
enablePanZoom(svg);
} else {
console.warn("SVG not found after 1.5s.");
}
}, 1500);
});
</script>
<h3>🔎 Filter Dependencies (Total Count: $($transitiveDepsCount + $topLevelDepsCount))</h3>
<input type="text" id="searchInput" onkeyup="filterTables()" placeholder="Search for NuGet package..." style="width: 100%; padding: 8px; margin-bottom: 20px; font-size: 16px;">
<style>
table {
border-collapse: collapse;
width: 100%;
margin-bottom: 40px;
font-size: 14px;
}
th, td {
border: 1px solid #ccc;
padding: 8px;
text-align: left;
}
tr:nth-child(even) {
background-color: #f9f9f9;
}
tr:hover {
background-color: #e2f0fb;
}
th {
background-color: #007bff;
color: white;
}
</style>
<h3>📦 Top-Level Dependencies (Count: $transitiveDepsCount)</h3>
<em>Note: Top-level Dependencies are Nuget packages which have a Dependency Path of length 1. To check which Nuget packages are actually listed in the project file(s), open the .csproj file(s) directly.</em>
<table id="topTable">
<thead><tr><th>Package</th><th>Dependency Path</th></tr></thead>
<tbody>
"@
$sortedTopLevel = $topLevelDeps.GetEnumerator() | Sort-Object Name
foreach ($dep in $sortedTopLevel) {
$script:mermaidGraph += "<tr><td>$($dep.Key)</td><td>$($dep.Value)</td></tr>`n"
}
$script:mermaidGraph += @"
</tbody>
</table>
<h3>📚 Transitive Dependencies (Count: $topLevelDepsCount)</h3>
<table id="transitiveTable">
<thead><tr><th>Package</th><th>Dependency Path</th></tr></thead>
<tbody>
"@
$sortedTransitive = $transitiveDeps.GetEnumerator() | Sort-Object Name
foreach ($dep in $sortedTransitive) {
$script:mermaidGraph += "<tr><td>$($dep.Key)</td><td>$($dep.Value)</td></tr>`n"
}
$script:mermaidGraph += @"
</tbody>
</table>
<script>
function filterTables() {
const input = document.getElementById('searchInput').value.toLowerCase();
['topTable', 'transitiveTable'].forEach(id => {
const rows = document.getElementById(id).getElementsByTagName('tr');
for (let i = 1; i < rows.length; i++) {
const cells = rows[i].getElementsByTagName('td');
const match = Array.from(cells).some(cell => cell.textContent.toLowerCase().includes(input));
rows[i].style.display = match ? '' : 'none';
}
});
}
</script>
</body>
</html>
"@
[System.IO.File]::WriteAllText($tempHtmlPath, $script:mermaidGraph, [System.Text.Encoding]::UTF8)
Start-Process $tempHtmlPath
}
# Run the function
Show-NugetDependencyGraph
The function above Show-NugetDependencyGraph can be added to the $profile file of the user you are logged in as.
Usage :
Make sure you are inside a folder where your project of the .NET Framework or .NET solution you want to see the Dependency graph and then just run the function Show-NugetDependencyGraph.
Inside the subfolders, you will find project.assets.json file, usually in the obj folder.
Note that this Powershell script do support showing multiple projects, but there are limitations in the graph drawing not allowing too many Nuget packages drawn into one and same graph, so the best analysis is done per-project.
The Powershell script adds support for pan and zoom to provide an interactive Nuget Dependency graph. VanillaJs is used.
Note that this script supports both .NET and .NET Framework.
The script will recursively look for project.assets.json files in subfolders and then use the Convert-FromJson method to inspect the json file(s) found.
The method Add-Dependencies is called recursively to build up the hash tables variables of the script that will keep the data structure that is keeping the list of Nuget libraries and transitive dependencies.
The script also builds up VanillaJs script string that adds pan and zoom capabilities and the html template provides tables for the top-level and transitive Nuget libraries.
Note also that the script builds up the html template that presents the Mermaid based Nuget dependency graph, using the script level variable $script:mermaidGraph.
Note the usage of script-level variable here, this is necessary to hoist the Powershell variable up since we make use of recursion and this is required.
Screenshots showing examples after running the Powershell script.
Table showing transitive dependencies in table :
