DEVOPSdigest

CAST announced the CAST Highlight summer 2023 release, featuring Open-Source Component Lifespan Insights—a new capability that automatically calculates the lifespan status of open-source software (OSS) components. Application owners can now understand components' lifespans to identify whether they are active, possibly deprecated, or immature.

In practice, OSS Component Lifespan Insights acts as a trusted advisor, guiding organizations towards components that are actively maintained and proven to be reliable, complementing CAST Highlight's existing OSS risk insights related to security vulnerabilities and potential license and intellectual property issues.

"In the world of software development, integrating OSS components into your business-critical application is akin to entrusting the health and stability of your project to them," said CAST Highlight Vice President Greg Rivera. "Understanding their lifespan status—whether they are active, possibly end-of-life, or conversely too new—is an important aspect of OSS governance, and we're thrilled to offer software intelligence technology that safely automates the analysis process."

The capability determines lifespan status based on components' release dates, applying tags like 'Possibly Deprecated' for components with no versions released in the past five years, 'Active' for components with versions released in the last five years, and 'Possibly Immature' for components less than a year old.

The summer release also introduces Container Scanning, Personalized User Home Pages, Customizable Cloud Service Recommendations, Ruby technology support for Cloud Readiness insights, and many other feature improvements.