🧠 Dead API Scanner

A CLI + programmatic tool to detect unused (dead) REST API endpoints in fullstack JavaScript/TypeScript projects.

Use it to clean up outdated routes, reduce backend bloat, and maintain high-quality code.

🚀 Features

• ✅ Scans Express-style backend routes (app.get, router.post, etc.)
• ✅ Detects frontend usage (fetch, axios, axios.create)
• ✅ Supports dynamic route patterns (e.g. /api/user/:id)
• ✅ Lists unused (dead) backend API endpoints
• ✅ CLI and programmatic usage
• ✅ JSON output for automation
• ✅ Custom ignore list support (--ignore=/api/ping,...)

📦 Installation

Install globally or use directly with npx:

npm install -g dead-api-scanner
# or
npx dead-api-scanner ./backend ./frontend

🧪 CLI Usage

The ./backend ./frontend arguments represent the paths to your server (API routes) and client (API usage) code.

npx dead-api-scanner ./backend ./frontend

🔍 Dead API Scanner Report ────────────────────────────── 📁 Backend routes scanned : 12 📦 Frontend API used : 9 🗑️ Dead APIs found : 3 ──────────────────────────────

❌ Dead Routes:

• GET /api/users/all
• POST /api/admin/create
• DELETE /api/order/456

npx dead-api-scanner ./backend ./frontend --json


npx dead-api-scanner ./backend ./frontend --ignore=/api/health,/api/ping

Suggestion:

```bash
# Output JSON for CI/CD
npx dead-api-scanner ./backend ./frontend --json

# Ignore specific endpoints
npx dead-api-scanner ./backend ./frontend --ignore=/api/health,/api/ping

📁 Config File Support

You can configure paths and ignored routes using a .deadapirc file in your project root:

{
  "backend": "./backend",
  "frontend": "./frontend",
  "ignore": ["/api/health", "/api/ping"]
}

📦 Programmatic Usage

import { findDeadApis } from 'dead-api-scanner';

const result = findDeadApis('./backend', './frontend', ['/api/health']);

console.log(result);
/*
{
  total: 5,
  used: 3,
  dead: [
    { method: 'GET', route: '/api/users/all' },
    { method: 'POST', route: '/api/admin/create' }
  ]
}
*/

🛠 Supported Patterns

app.get('/api/user', ...)
router.post('/api/login', ...)


fetch('/api/user')
axios.get('/api/user')
api.post('/users') // via axios.create({ baseURL: '/api' })

📄 License

MIT © 2024 iamxerrycan

Made with ❤️ to help developers delete unused code and sleep better.