Using the Polyspace as You Code Perspective in Visual Studio

The Polyspace^® as You Code™ extension has a dedicated perspective in Visual Studio^® that groups all the relevant Polyspace views.

To open the Polyspace as You Code perspective, select Extensions > Polyspace > Open Polyspace Windows. The Polyspace as You Code perspective displays information about your configuration, analysis, and results in the following views:

Configuration
Quality Monitoring
Headers
Error List
Result Details
Baseline

Configuration View

The Configuration view shows your current Analysis Options settings and the status of the generated build options file, if applicable.

In this view, you can:

Click to open the Checkers selection window. See Configure Analysis Settings.
Click to configure analysis options. See Visual Studio: Configure Checkers and Coding Rules in Polyspace as You Code.
View your current build settings and build options status. See Visual Studio: Generate Build Options for Polyspace as You Code.
Click the fast analysis mode line to toggle on or off fast analysis mode.
Click to open the Polyspace documentation.

Quality Monitoring View

The Quality Monitoring view displays each file that you have selected for analysis in a list along with the status of the analysis, the number of results for each file, and which baselines are associated with the file.

You can manually add a file to the Quality Monitoring list or have Polyspace automatically add a file to the Quality Monitoring list when you save a file.

To add a file manually, right-click the file in the editor or in the Solution Explorer and select Polyspace > Add file to the Polyspace Quality Monitoring list.
To add files automatically, click the icon to open the Options window and then select the checkbox for Add to Quality Monitoring list on save.

To manually start an analysis, right-click a file and select Run Polyspace Analysis. You can also start a sequential file-by-file analysis of all files in the Quality Monitoring list by clicking the icon.

If you remove a file from the Quality Monitoring view after you have run an analysis on that file, Polyspace removes the results associated with that file as well as all the included files. If you add the removed file back to the Quality Monitoring view, no results are associated with the file until you run a new analysis.

Hover over a file in the Quality Monitoring list to view which local or Polyspace Access baselines are associated with that file. If a Polyspace Access baseline is associated with the file, the name of the Polyspace Access project the baseline is from is displayed.

Headers View

When you analyze a file, Polyspace also analyzes the header files that are included by the file and that are in the same folder as the file. If Polyspace reports results in a header file, you see an H next to the analyzed file in the Quality Monitoring view. Click the analyzed file in the Quality Monitoring view to display all associated analyzed headers in the Headers view.

Header files show in the list only if they contain results. Click the file in the Headers view to open its results in the Error List view.

Error List View

The Error List view shows the all the analysis results, listed one result per line. Each line shows additional information, such as:

The name of the defect or coding rule, family, and description
Name of the file containing the result
Review information

Results are grouped by results family. To change the grouping or to view results in a flat list, right-click in the Error List view and then select Grouping and a column header to sort by.

The results that show in the Error List view represent the results for the files that you select in the Quality Monitoring view. The number of results in the Error List view can change and does not represent results for all analyzed files.

When you select a file in the Quality Monitoring view, in the Error List view you see results from:

Each file listed in the Quality Monitoring view including the selected file.
The header files of the file you select in the Quality Monitoring view.

If you select a different file in the Quality Monitoring view:

Polyspace removes the previously selected file's header file results from the Error List view.
The newly selected file's header file results show in the Error List view.

Result Details View

When you select a result in the Error List view or in the editor, the Result Details view shows additional information about the result. This includes the rule definition of the violation, the location of the violation in your code, any traceback information when available, and the review information imported from the baseline. If you select multiple lines of code, the Result Details view shows the result details for all the results in the selection.

Select a result and click the icon to view contextual help about that result.

To lock this view while you browse results in the source code or the Error List view, click . When active, the Result Details view does not update when you select a different result. Click again to unlock the Result Details view.

Baseline View

The Baseline view shows any local baselines and any baselines you have downloaded from Polyspace Access™ results.

Visual Studio Baseline view

In this view, you can:

Click the filter line to enable or disable filtering the Error List to show only results that are new when compared to a baseline.
Create local baselines for all files in the quality monitoring list. Right-click local baselines and select Create a local baseline for all files in the Quality Monitoring list.
Update or remove a local baseline. Right-click the local baseline and select the relevant option from the menu.
Click to open and edit the Polyspace Access baseline settings.
Click the icon to connect to Polyspace Access. Click the icon to disconnect from Polyspace Access.
Click to download or update your Polyspace Access baselines.
Right-click a Polyspace Access baseline and select Open Project in Polyspace Access web to open the baseline project in the Polyspace Access interface.

Polyspace as you Code monitors your baselines to verify the run ID of the baseline matches the latest run ID in Polyspace Access. You can hover over a baseline to view details such as the run ID the baseline uses and the status of the baseline. Baselines that have never been downloaded or are outdated appear in yellow text in the Baseline pane. Baselines that are outdated also display the outdated icon in the Baseline pane. To keep using the most up-to-date baseline, periodically update your baselines by downloading the latest results from Polyspace Access.

If the results from the baseline run are generated with a Polyspace version that is older than your Polyspace as You Code version, the Baseline view shows a warning.

For more information on creating baselines and connecting to Polyspace Access with Polyspace as You Code, see Visual Studio: Configure Baseline Results in Polyspace as You Code.