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Overview

OWASP Nest provides comprehensive project discovery and exploration capabilities. Track over 200+ active OWASP projects with real-time GitHub integration, health metrics, and contribution analytics.

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Project Model

Projects in Nest are repository-based entities that aggregate data from multiple sources: 
backend/apps/owasp/models/project.py

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Key Attributes

Metadata

Name, description, level, type, leaders, tags

GitHub Stats

Stars, forks, contributors, commits, releases

Activity

Issues, PRs, contributions, commit history

Health Score

Automated health metrics and compliance checks

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Project Levels

Projects are categorized into four maturity levels:
LevelDescriptionBadge
FlagshipMature projects with significant impact🏆
ProductionProduction-ready with active maintenance✅
LabExperimental projects under development🧪
IncubatorNew projects in early stages🌱
Project levels are sourced from repository metadata and automatically synced from OWASP Foundation repositories.

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Project Types

Projects are classified by type:
  • Code - Software tools and applications
  • Documentation - Guides, standards, and educational content
  • Tool - Security testing and analysis tools
  • Other - Miscellaneous project types

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Browsing Projects

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Web Interface

The projects page provides a rich browsing experience: 
// frontend/src/app/projects/page.tsx
Features:
  • Real-time search with Algolia
  • Filter by project level
  • Sort by creation date, update date, stars
  • Pagination with 25 projects per page
  • Project cards with metadata and contributors

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API Access

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List Projects

GET /api/v0/projects
Query Parameters:
  • q - Structured search query (e.g., name:security stars:>100)
  • level - Filter by project level (incubator, lab, production, flagship)
  • ordering - Sort order (created_at, -created_at, updated_at, -updated_at)
  • page - Page number for pagination
Example: 
curl "https://nest.owasp.org/api/v0/projects?level=flagship&ordering=-stars_count"
Response: 
{
  "items": [
    {
      "key": "zap",
      "name": "OWASP Zed Attack Proxy",
      "level": "flagship",
      "created_at": "2024-01-15T10:30:00Z",
      "updated_at": "2024-03-01T14:22:00Z"
    }
  ],
  "count": 42,
  "next": "https://nest.owasp.org/api/v0/projects?page=2",
  "previous": null
}

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Get Project Details

GET /api/v0/projects/{project_key}
Example: 
curl "https://nest.owasp.org/api/v0/projects/zap"
Response: 
{
  "key": "zap",
  "name": "OWASP Zed Attack Proxy",
  "description": "The OWASP Zed Attack Proxy (ZAP) is an easy to use integrated penetration testing tool.",
  "level": "flagship",
  "leaders": [
    {
      "key": "simon",
      "name": "Simon Bennetts"
    }
  ],
  "created_at": "2024-01-15T10:30:00Z",
  "updated_at": "2024-03-01T14:22:00Z"
}
The project key is the repository name with the www-project- prefix removed. For example, www-project-zap becomes zap.

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Project Metrics

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GitHub Statistics

Nest aggregates statistics from all project repositories: 
# Synthetic fields computed from related repositories
stars_count: int           # Total stars across all repos
forks_count: int           # Total forks
contributors_count: int    # Unique contributors
commits_count: int         # Total commits
releases_count: int        # Published releases
open_issues_count: int     # Current open issues
watchers_count: int        # Repository watchers
subscribers_count: int     # Repository subscribers

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Contribution Analytics

Projects track contribution activity over time: 
contribution_data: dict    # Daily contribution counts (YYYY-MM-DD -> count)
contribution_stats: dict   # Breakdown by type (commits, issues, PRs, releases)

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Health Metrics

Automated health scoring based on:
  • Documentation completeness
  • Recent activity
  • Issue response time
  • Release frequency
  • Community engagement
  • Multiple project leaders
  • Funding policy compliance
health_score: float | None  # Score from 0-100

Health Requirements

Projects must meet specific criteria to maintain good health:
  • Multiple Leaders: More than one project leader
  • Funding Compliance: All repositories have funding configuration
  • Active Maintenance: Recent commits and releases

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Project Properties

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Repository Relationships

Projects can link to multiple GitHub repositories: 
organizations: ManyToMany[Organization]
owners: ManyToMany[User]
repositories: ManyToMany[Repository]
owasp_repository: ForeignKey[Repository]  # Main OWASP page repo

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Metadata Fields

languages: list[str]      # Programming languages
licenses: list[str]       # Open source licenses
topics: list[str]         # GitHub topics
tags: list[str]          # OWASP tags
custom_tags: list[str]   # Custom categorization
audience: list[str]      # Target audience

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Timestamps

created_at: datetime      # Project creation date
updated_at: datetime      # Last update from GitHub
pushed_at: datetime       # Last push to any repository
released_at: datetime     # Most recent release date

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Issue Tracking

Projects aggregate issues from all linked repositories: 
# Query all issues across project repositories
project.issues                      # All issues
project.open_issues                 # Open issues only
project.issues_count                # Total count
project.open_issues_count           # Open count
project.unanswered_issues_count     # No comments
project.unassigned_issues_count     # No assignees
Set track_issues = False to exclude specific projects from issue aggregation.

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Pull Requests

Track pull request activity: 
project.pull_requests               # All PRs
project.pull_requests_count         # Total count
project.open_pull_requests_count    # Currently open
project.pull_request_last_created_at # Most recent PR

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Releases

Access published releases: 
project.published_releases          # Non-draft releases
project.releases_count              # Total releases
project.recent_releases_count       # Last 60 days

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Project URLs

project.nest_key                    # "zap" (without www-project- prefix)
project.nest_url                    # "/projects/zap"
project.get_absolute_url()          # Full URL with domain

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Active Projects

Nest uses a custom manager to filter active projects: 
# Only projects with active repositories
Project.active_projects.all()

# Count of active projects
Project.active_projects_count()

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Code Reference

Key implementation files:
  • Model: backend/apps/owasp/models/project.py:36
  • API: backend/apps/api/rest/v0/project.py:30
  • Manager: backend/apps/owasp/models/managers/project.py
  • Frontend: frontend/src/app/projects/page.tsx:13

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AI Integration

Projects are indexed for AI-powered search and insights: 
backend/apps/ai/common/extractors/project.py
Extracted Content:
  • Project descriptions and summaries
  • Repository topics and tags
  • Programming languages and licenses
  • Project statistics and health metrics
  • Leadership information
  • Related URLs
  • Search - Advanced project search and filtering
  • AI Insights - AI-powered project recommendations
  • Slack Bot - Query projects via /projects command

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