The Best Kept Secrets About Visual Studio C++
Visual Studio C++ is one of the most powerful and widely used IDEs for developing C++ applications. Also, You can develop any type of application, including desktop, mobile, cross-platform, games, and more using Visual Studio C++. It contains a lot of tools that simplify and speed up the development process and help make programmers work more productive.
In this article, we will explore important Visual Studio C++ features that make life easier for programmers, but which you may not know about yet.
What are Predictive IntelliSense and IntelliSense Filtering?
How Can I Use C++ Code Analysis Tools?
What is CPU Usage Visualization?
Is There Value in Run to Click Debugging?
Can You Debug on Any Platform and Place?
What is Source Control?
How Does Collaboration Work?
What is Unit Testing?
Which Extensions Are Available?
How Can You Start Using Visual Assist?
What are Predictive IntelliSense and IntelliSense Filtering?
The IntelliSense feature allows you to increase the productivity of writing code, and learn information about the codebase.
Predictive IntelliSense is a feature that uses the conceptual meaning of the code to limit the number of results shown in the IntelliSense drop-down. If the drop-down list is too long, it is inconvenient to scroll and it can take a lot of time. Predictive IntelliSense allows you to show only the type of results you need.
In addition, IntelliSense Filtering has also been developed. It allows you to filter the results in the drop-down list by the list of different criteria, such as variables and constants, functions, types, macros, enums, namespaces.
Predictive IntelliSense is off by default, but you can always turn it on in your IDE settings.
How Can I Use C++ Code Analysis Tools?
Visual Studio C++ provides you with code analysis tools that check your code against best practices, perform bounds checks, type checks (including constant checks), and resource management checks. They then make suggestions to improve your code. However, Each improvement proposal contains links that point to the relevant parts of the guidance document in which the particular proposal is discussed.
What is CPU Usage Visualization?
The CPU usage performance tool allows you to show a graph of CPU time usage by different parts of the code. This Visual Studio C++ feature greatly simplifies the investigation of performance problems.
The CPU usage tool can be run with or without debugging. It can run in any type of application. For example, in an open Visual Studio project, in an installed Microsoft Store app, or attached to a running app or process.
Is There Value in Run to Click Debugging?
Visual Studio C++ has a Run to Click feature that greatly simplifies the debugging process. It allows you to execute a program to a specified location without having to set temporary breakpoints.
You can quickly step through the code up to a given line, check the variables on that line, and then continue debugging everything while keeping your focus and attention at that point. Run to Click works between the same method, different methods, and inside loops.
Can You Debug on Any Platform and Place?
Visual Studio C++ allows you to debug code that is running anywhere: in a local Windows desktop app, in an Android emulator, in a remote Azure instance, on an iOS device, in a game console, or in any web browser.
To debug code, you can use the wide range of tools that IntelliTrace offers, as well as a deep analysis of dump files.
What is Source Control?
Visual Studio C++ allows you to create Git and GitHub repositories, and add code to existing remote repositories. In addition, it has a Git menu that provides you with the ability to manage repositories without leaving your favorite IDE.
Visual Studio C++ has the repository window, where you can view the history of your commits. One more useful tool is the window where you can compare lines of code and resolve conflicts.
How Does Collaboration Work?
Visual Studio C++ provides a Live Share collaboration tool. It allows you to join a colleague’s session and collaborate on any type of application code.
With Live Share, you can co-edit and debug code, write chat messages, view comments, and conduct technical interviews and code reviews. Live Share covers all your collaboration tool needs. It works for a variety of use cases and gives you the ability to expand and customize it.
What is Unit Testing?
Using Visual Studio C++ you can write and run unit tests on any framework you choose.
The Test Explorer tool provided by Visual Studio C++ makes it easy and efficient to work with unit tests. Using the Test Explorer, you can group tests by category, filter the list of tests, run and debug unit tests, and analyze test coverage.
You can also view the execution results of all tests, as well as the details for each test individually. If the test fails, detailed error information is also available.
Which Extensions Are Available?
If you are missing any of the tools in Visual Studio C++, or want to customize or improve some of them, you can install an extension or write your own.
Additionally, there is a large list of extensions available in the Visual Studio marketplace. One of them is Visual Assist. It allows you to easily edit, automatically generate, and refactor code. Visual Assist offers convenient tools for navigating and viewing the project structure.
How Can You Start Using Visual Assist?
Ready to use the listed features provided by Visual Studio C++ and therefore increase the productivity of C++ application development? Install the Visual Assist extension and get more convenient and useful tools that allow you to make the application development process fast and enjoyable.
