Visual Lint Professional Edition 1.5

Visual Lint is an add-in for Microsoft Visual Studio and Visual C++ which closely integrates the Gimpel PC-Lint code analysis tool within the Visual Studio integrated development environment.

Although PC-Lint does a great job of analysing C++ source and header files for potential problems, it is a generic cross-platform tool and as such is not closely integrated with development environments. This is less than ideal if you want to perform a complete analysis of an entire workspace or solution, and furthermore, it can be difficult to spot the most serious potential problems amongst the mass of results.

Visual Lint overcomes this by closely integrating the Lint analysis process with Visual Studio and making analysis results available to the developer using dedicated displays, making it easier for them to act on the warnings identified. Automated background analysis ensures that up to date analysis results are available when you need them.

Visual Lint is available in Free, Standard and Professional Editions:

- Visual Lint Free Edition allows manual lint analysis to be carried out in much the same way as traditional methods of integrating lint tools into the development environment. In addition, it it also offers dedicated displays and the ability to quickly look up the meaning of a particular lint message.

- Visual Lint Standard Edition adds features such as automated background analysis and HTML reports, and is focused on automatically presenting relevant analysis results to the developer as he or she works on files within a solution. The capability for automated re-analysis of files where necessary ensures that up to date analysis results are always available to the developer.

- Visual Lint Professional Edition offers additional features more applicable to advanced users, notably whole-project analysis, the ability to define custom categories of lint messages and use custom lint configurations on a per solution or per project basis.

Features :

Visual Lint offers a number of features to help make using PC-Lint easier and more productive. These include:

The integraton of PC-Lint closely within the Visual Studio integrated development environment to make Lint analysis results easily available to the developer.

Editing of the main PC-Lint configuration files (std.lnt and options.lnt) within the Visual Studio IDE, via dedicated commands.

Analysis of implementation files automatically takes into account project settings and the active configuration. There is no need to type in complex command lines or write batch files.

Files can be manually analysed from the context menu of the code editor at any time, with results presented in a dedicated pane in the Output Window.

The PC-Lint manual (a PDF file) is easily accessible within the Visual Studio IDE via a dedicated command.

Dedicated Analysis Status, Analysis Results and Warning Lookup toolwindows giving detailed information upon the current status of analysis within the solution and current file, and the ability to directly look up the meaning of any PC-Lint message.1

Files within a solution are automatically analysed in the background to build up a "Lint Profile" of the current solution while the system is idle. Multiple files can be analysed simultaneously, with user preferences determining the maximum number of analysis threads. 1

When a file is opened for editing within the IDE, the corresponding analysis results are automatically presented in a dedicated Analysis Results and (in raw form) in a "Lint Analysis Results" pane within the Output Window. Double clicking on a lint message in either display will open the corresponding source file at the offending line, and display information on what the message actually means. 1

When a file is saved, it is automatically queued for re-analysis. 1

HTML and XML reports can be produced in a similar format as Riverblade's LintProject command line tool. 1

In addition to single file ("unit checkout" analysis, Visual Lint can also analyse all files in a project together. 2

Individual projects within a solution can be selectively included or excluded from background lint analysis simply by ticking or clearing a checkbox in the Analysis Status Display. 2

Specific lint issues can be assigned to user defined lint issue categories. This allows (for example) errors to be grouped into subcategories of moderate, severe and critical. 2

Customisable lint configuration files can be defined for specific solutions and projects, overriding the global lint configuration. 2

Compatible with Microsoft eMbedded Visual C++ 4.0, Visual C++ 6.0, Visual Studio .NET 2002, Visual Studio .NET 2003 and Visual Studio 2005. Please contact us if you require support for other platforms.

Requirements:	No special requirements
Release Date:	November 12, 2006
Platforms:	Windows 2000, Windows XP, Windows 2003 , Windows Vista Business,Windows Vista Enterprise,Windows Vista Ultimate
Keyword:	Add-in,  C++,  Code Analysis,  Elective Note,  Errors,  Extensibility,  Gimpel,  Ide,  Information,  Integration,  Lint,  Microsoft,  Pc-lint,  Plug-in,  Visual,  Visual C++,  Visual Studio,  Warnings
Version 1.5 Changes:	Visual Lint 1.5 adds support for Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0 and eMbedded Visual C++ 4.0 to Riverblade's Visual Lint integrated code analysis solution.
Users rating:	0/10