CLI Flags

Every flag available in the depwhy CLI, with examples and expected output.

--env

Scans packages installed in the current virtual environment rather than reading from a file.

$ depwhy --env
✓ No conflicts found

--json

Outputs results as machine-readable JSON to stdout, making it easy to integrate depwhy into scripts and tooling.

$ depwhy requirements.txt --json

{
"has_conflicts": true,
"analyzed_packages": 6,
"conflicts": [
  {
    "package": "urllib3",
    "problem": "requests==2.28.0 requires urllib3>=1.21.1,<1.27, but you have urllib3==2.0.0 pinned",
    "solution": {
      "description": "Remove your pin — use urllib3==1.26.18 (latest compatible)",
      "pip_command": "pip install urllib3==1.26.18",
      "is_alternative": false
    },
    "alternative": {
      "description": "Upgrade requests to >=2.29.0 (loosens urllib3 upper bound)",
      "pip_command": "pip install requests==2.29.0",
      "is_alternative": true
    }
  }
],
"warnings": []
}

--quiet

Suppresses all output. The result is communicated exclusively through the exit code.

$ depwhy requirements.txt --quiet
$ echo $?
1

--offline

Uses only cached metadata from previous runs. No network requests are made.

$ depwhy requirements.txt --offline
2 conflict(s) found
...

--python-version

Overrides the Python version used when evaluating environment markers such as python_version < '3.11'. This lets you check for conflicts against a different Python version than the one you are currently running.

$ depwhy requirements.txt --python-version 3.11

For example, a dependency that specifies ; python_version < '3.11' will be included when you pass --python-version 3.10 but excluded when you pass --python-version 3.11.

--no-color

Disables Rich color output, producing plain text. Useful for piping output to files or tools that do not support ANSI escape codes.

$ depwhy requirements.txt --no-color
2 conflict(s) found
urllib3
Problem: requests==2.28.0 requires urllib3>=1.21.1,<1.27, but you have urllib3==2.0.0 pinned
Solution: Remove your pin — use urllib3==1.26.18 (latest compatible)
  → pip install urllib3==1.26.18

--version

Prints the installed version of depwhy and exits.

$ depwhy --version
depwhy 0.1.1

Flag Combinations

Several flags can be combined for common workflows:

• --json --quiet — Returns only the exit code while still allowing JSON to be captured via redirection: depwhy req.txt --json --quiet > results.json
• --env --json — Scans the active virtual environment and outputs results as JSON, useful for automated environment audits.
• --offline --no-color — Runs a fast, cache-only check with plain text output, ideal for constrained environments without network access or terminal color support.