C++ Tools - CppDepend

I’ve been trying various static analysis tools on the C++ code of The Server Framework. So far I’m using Resharper C++ and the Gimpel PC-Lint Plus Beta on a regular basis and I’ve now added CppDepend into the loop.

Full disclosure. I have been given a CppDepend license.

As I’ve said before, whilst CppDepend is easy to get hold of, easy to install and “just works” I don’t find it that useful. I can certainly remember large enterprise clients where this kind of tool would be invaluable for management level analysis of large codebases but for a small development team of competent people it’s less immediately useful. That said, I’ve found several warnings that it produces to be helpful and so I’ve been running it alongside the other tools as it fills some gaps.

Since I’m in the process of dropping support for several old compilers I can finally begin to move the codebase forward to slightly more modern C++. All of the tools help with this and CppDepend has some ‘modernise C++’ checks that I’m finding useful.

I like the fact that I can run CppDepend as a stand alone GUI. I prefer this method to using fully integrated Visual Studio extensions.

I like the idea of the regression reports but haven’t actually set up a baseline report and run them…

I’m not sure that I would purchase a license for this tool but I know clients that could benefit from using it.