PHP Depend – Software Metrics for PHP

PHP Depend – Software Metrics for PHP

PHP_Depend is a small program that performs static code analysis on a given source base. Static code analysis means that PHP_Depend first takes the source code and parses it into an easily processable internal data structure. This data structure is normally called an AST (Abstract Syntax Tree), that represents the different statements and elements used in the analyzed source base. Then it takes the generated AST and measures several values, the so called software metrics. Each of this values stands for a quality aspect in the the analyzed software, observed from a very high level of abstraction, because no source was reviewed manually until now.