NuAnalytics

NuAnalytics is a Rust-based tool for analyzing computer science curricula. It computes detailed metrics about curriculum structure including complexity, blocking relationships, delay paths, and centrality measures to help understand how courses are organized and their impact on students.

It is based off the work of Greg Heileman, and CurricularAnalytics.org. Current version just provides a command line batch capability and more report options.

Features

• Curriculum Analysis: Parse CSV-formatted curriculum files and analyze course dependencies
• Metric Computation: Calculate comprehensive metrics including:
  • Complexity: Measure of course density and impact on overall curriculum
  • Blocking: Count of courses directly blocked by a given course
  • Delay: Longest path from a course to course with no prerequisites
  • Centrality: Importance of a course in the curriculum network
• Report Generation: Create visual reports in multiple formats:
  • HTML: Interactive web-based reports with dependency graphs
  • PDF: Print-ready reports via Chrome/Chromium conversion
  • Markdown: Text-based reports for documentation
• Term Scheduling: Automatic course scheduling respecting prerequisites and credit limits
• Configuration Management: Flexible configuration system with CLI overrides

Quick Start

Installation

Stable (crates.io) - Recommended

Install the CLI via Cargo:

cargo install nu-analytics

This provides the nuanalytics binary globally.

From Git (for latest)

Install directly from Git:

cargo install --git https://github.com/NeuCurricularAnalytics/NuAnalytics --bin nuanalytics

Building

cargo build --release

The executable will be at target/release/nuanalytics.

Running (installed)

Analyze a curriculum CSV file and generate both metrics CSV and HTML report:

nuanalytics planner path/to/curriculum.csv

Generate only a PDF report:

nuanalytics planner path/to/curriculum.csv --no-csv --report-format pdf

Generate only CSV metrics (no report):

nuanalytics planner path/to/curriculum.csv --no-report

Manage configuration:

nuanalytics config get level
nuanalytics config set level debug

Documentation

• Config Command - Configure NuAnalytics settings (logging, database, output directories)
• Planner Command - Analyze curricula for a degree plan, compute metrics, and generate reports

Development

If you are contributing or working locally, see Development.md for cargo run workflows and setup.

Project Structure

├── src/
│   ├── cli/              # Command-line interface
│   │   ├── main.rs       # CLI entry point
│   │   ├── args.rs       # Argument definitions (clap)
│   │   └── commands/     # Command handlers
│   ├── core/             # Core analysis engine
│   │   ├── config.rs     # Configuration management
│   │   ├── metrics.rs    # Metric computation algorithms
│   │   ├── metrics_export.rs  # CSV export functionality
│   │   ├── models/       # Data structures (Course, Degree, Plan, School, DAG)
│   │   ├── planner/      # CSV parsing and planning
│   │   └── report/       # Report generation
│   │       ├── formats/  # HTML, PDF, Markdown reporters
│   │       └── term_scheduler.rs  # Course scheduling algorithm
│   ├── logger/           # Internal logging module
│   └── lib.rs            # Library exports
├── tests/                # Integration and unit tests
├── docs/                 # Documentation
└── Cargo.toml            # Project manifest

Report Formats

HTML Reports

Self-contained HTML files with:

• Interactive course dependency visualization
• Color-coded complexity indicators
• Term-by-term schedule view
• Detailed metrics table

PDF Reports

Generated via headless Chrome/Chromium:

• Same content as HTML reports
• Print-optimized layout
• Requires Chrome, Chromium, or custom converter

Markdown Reports

Simple text-based reports suitable for:

• Documentation systems
• Version control diffing
• Email attachments

License

See LICENSE file for details.