CollaborativeDepends

CollaborativeDepends is a term used to describe a collaborative approach to dependency management in software projects. It envisions making dependency declarations a collectively curated artifact rather than the responsibility of a single maintainer.

In practice, dependencies from multiple modules or subprojects are gathered into a shared manifest or managed by a governance tool. A merged dependency graph is produced, with explicit version ranges, provenance, and rules for handling transitive requirements.

Governance typically involves proposals from contributors, reviews or approvals, automated validation in CI, and an audit trail showing who suggested each dependency. The system may support conflict resolution, pinning, and rollback mechanisms.

Benefits include greater consistency across a multi-repo ecosystem, improved security through community review, and easier planning for large refactors. It can also enhance reproducibility by documenting the rationale for each declared dependency.

Challenges include decision-making overhead, potential for bloated graphs, handling circular dependencies, and protecting sensitive information. Adoption requires clear governance policies and tooling to enforce standards.

CollaborativeDepends is not a standardized feature in mainstream package managers and is primarily discussed as a theoretical or experimental concept. Related ideas exist in co-maintained dependencies, peer dependencies, and centralized dependency governance practices.