CppDepend – A Review

In my concurrency class, I use more than 60 programs. Most of the programs consist of a single source file. I’m quite curious if the static code analysis tool CppDepend can find any issues in my sources. Let me try it out.

My Special Use-Case

My use case is unique for two reasons. First, I don’t expect too many issues with my examples for one reason: I give quite often concurrency classes and use these examples in my classes; therefore, I had many code reviewer. Second, my programs are most of the times not really sophisticated and quite short. They should only serve one purpose: show the particular concurrency features in isolation.

My Strategy

Due to my unique circumstances, here are my steps to get the static code analysis with CppDepend.

Generate a CMake file for Visual Studio, GCC, and Clang
Generate a Visual Studio Project from CMake
Import the Visual Studio Project project into CppDepend
Make the code analysis in CppDepend

Here we go.

1. Generate a CMake file for Visual Studio, GCC, and Clang

My customers work with Visual Studio, GCC, or Clang. To provide a way to compile all C++ sources to executables automatically, I use CMake. In sum, I have more than 300 C++ sources files in various directories. Each source file should become an executable. Writing a CMakeList.txt manually for each directory would be a boring step. Additionally, I would have to adapt it each time, if I modified the file names. Terrible!. To automate the boring stuff, I wrote a small python script generateCMakeFile.py. generateCMakeFile.py generates a CMakeList.txt file for the directory, in which I invoke it.

Here it is.

# generateCMakeFile.py

import fnmatch
import os

# A few constants
SUFFIX = "*.cpp"
OUTPUT = "CMakeLists.txt"

# The output file
outputFile = open(OUTPUT, "w")

# Return the full path to all files respecting the pattern
def getFiles(dir_, patterns="*", recursive=True):
    patterns = patterns.split()
    retValue = []
    for path, dirs, files in os.walk(dir_):
        for file_ in files:
            for pattern in patterns:
                if fnmatch.fnmatch(file_, pattern):
                    retValue.append(os.path.join(path, file_))
                    break
        if not recursive: break
    return retValue


# Get all files of the current working directory ending with *.cpp
def getAllFilenames():
    allFiles = getFiles(os.getcwd(), SUFFIX , False) 
    return [ os.path.basename(file_)[:-len(SUFFIX)+1] for file_ in allFiles ]

# Create the CMakeLists.txt header for GCC, Clang, and MSVC
def getHeader():
    return """# Require a recent version of cmake
cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 2.8.4 FATAL_ERROR)

# This project is C++ based.
project(seminar)

if(${CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_ID} STREQUAL GNU)
    set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "-O3 -std=c++14 -pthread")
    if (CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_VERSION VERSION_LESS 5.0)
	    message(WARNING "!!!! GCC versions must be at least 5.0 !!!!")
        message(WARNING "!!!! Adust the makefile to build with a different compiler. !!!!")
    endif()
elseif (${CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_ID} STREQUAL Clang)
    set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "-O3 -std=c++14 -pthread")
    if (CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_VERSION VERSION_LESS 3.5)
        message(WARNING "!!!! Clang version must be at least 3.5 !!!!")
		message(WARNING "!!!! Adust the makefile to build with a different compiler. !!!!")
    endif()
elseif (${CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_ID} STREQUAL MSVC)
    set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "/Ox /EHsc")
    if (CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_VERSION VERSION_LESS 19.10)    
        message(WARNING "!!!! MSVC version must be at least 19.10 !!!!")
    endif()	
else()
    message(WARNING "!!! You are using an unsupported compiler! Compilation has only been tested with GCC >= 5.0, Clang >= 3.5, or MSVC >= 19.10. !!!")
endif()
    

set(CMAKE_RUNTIME_OUTPUT_DIRECTORY "bin/")

set(CMAKE_VERBOSE_MAKEFILE on)

"""
    
# Create the list of all source files    
def getAllNames(allNames):    
    outNames = "set(example_programs" 
    for entry in allNames:
        outNames += "    " + entry + "\n"
    outNames += "   )"
    outNames += "\n"
    
    return outNames

# Create an executable from the source file
def getTail():
    tail = """foreach(example_program ${example_programs})
  set(sources ${example_program}.cpp)
  source_group("Source Files" FILES{sources})
  add_executable(${example_program} ${sources})
endforeach()"""
    return tail


# Create the CMakeLists.txt
allNames = getAllFilenames()

print >> outputFile, getHeader()

print >> outputFile, getAllNames(allNames)

print >> outputFile, getTail()

To understand the program, you should start with the three print statements add the end. The brown font goes directly into CMakeList.txt.

Modernes C++ Mentoring

"Fundamentals for C++ Professionals" (open)

"Design Patterns and Architectural Patterns with C++" (open)

"C++20: Get the Details" (open)

"Concurrency with Modern C++" (open)

"Generic Programming (Templates) with C++": October 2024

"Embedded Programming with Modern C++": October 2024

"Clean Code: Best Practices for Modern C++": March 2025

Do you want to stay informed: Subscribe.

Using the generateCMakeFile.py is straightforward. I copied the generateCMakeFile.py to the directory, I wanted to use it. This step is not necessary but make the commandline easier to write.

Finally, this is the autogenerate CMakeList.txt.

# Require a recent version of cmake
cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 2.8.4 FATAL_ERROR)

# This project is C++ based.
project(seminar)

if(${CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_ID} STREQUAL GNU)
    set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "-O3 -std=c++14 -pthread")
    if (CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_VERSION VERSION_LESS 5.0)
	    message(WARNING "!!!! GCC versions must be at least 5.0 !!!!")
        message(WARNING "!!!! Adust the makefile to build with a different compiler. !!!!")
    endif()
elseif (${CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_ID} STREQUAL Clang)
    set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "-O3 -std=c++14 -pthread")
    if (CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_VERSION VERSION_LESS 3.5)
        message(WARNING "!!!! Clang version must be at least 3.5 !!!!")
		message(WARNING "!!!! Adust the makefile to build with a different compiler. !!!!")
    endif()
elseif (${CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_ID} STREQUAL MSVC)
    set(CMAKE_CXX_FLAGS "/Ox /EHsc")
    if (CMAKE_CXX_COMPILER_VERSION VERSION_LESS 19.10)    
        message(WARNING "!!!! MSVC version must be at least 19.10 !!!!")
    endif()	
else()
    message(WARNING "!!! You are using an unsupported compiler! Compilation has only been tested with GCC >= 5.0, Clang >= 3.5, or MSVC >= 19.10. !!!")
endif()
    

set(CMAKE_RUNTIME_OUTPUT_DIRECTORY "bin/")

set(CMAKE_VERBOSE_MAKEFILE on)


set(example_programs    acquireConsume
    acquireRelease
    asyncLazyEager
    atomicCondition
    atomic
    blockingAsync
    conditionVariable
    dataRaceOnX
    dotProduct
    fetch_mult
    lockGuard
    mutex
    newAlgorithm
    packagedTask
    packagedTaskReuse
    promiseFuture
    promiseFutureSynchronize
    readerWriterLock
    relaxed
    safeInitializationCallOnce
    safeInitializationStatic
    singleton
    spinlockAcquireRelease
    spinLock
    threadArguments
    threadCreate
    threadLifetime
    threadLocal
    threadMethods
    time
    timeDuration
    transitivity
    uniqueLock
   )

foreach(example_program ${example_programs})
  set(sources ${example_program}.cpp)
  source_group("Source Files" FILES{sources})
  add_executable(${example_program} ${sources})
endforeach()

2. Generate a Visual Studio Project from CMake

To make my CppDepend life more comfortable, I switch from Linux to Windows and continue with Visual Studio.

This step creates a 64-bit Visual Studio Project in the directory “C:\Users\raine\build“.

3. Import the Visual Studio Project project into CppDepend

Now, it’s time to start CppDepend and create a new project Concurrency:

Next, I add Visual Studio to my new project.

One step is still missing. I have to press the analyse button. It took my eight cores a few second to analyse the source files.

4. Make the code analysis in CppDepend

As I already assumed it, the most checks are green:

Of course, I’m only interested in the red (Error) and yellow (Warning) ones.

Error:

Quality Gates:
- This issue boils down to mainly one function: The method is too big, has too many local variables, and is poorly documented. What I liked about CppDepend was that it shows me the metric I violated.

Warnings:

Code Smells:
- The previous break of the Quality Gates was also a Code Smell; therefore, I can ignore this warning.
Object Oriented Design:
- Only one of the thirty rules was violated: three of my constructors taking one argument were not explicit. Honestly, this is a rule I often preach in my seminars. Shame on me.

Misc:
- This is also an issue I should fix. I passed a std::string by copy.

Dead Code:
- This violation was funny. The violation was that the destructor of the singleton was never called. To my excuse, I only used a singleton to explain the thread-safe initialisation of a variable.
Naming Conventions:
- I’m not a big fan of Hungarian notation. Therefore, I wouldn’t prefix an instance variable with a m_ or a static with a s_.

My Resume

Here is my short resume. I put not too much effort into the analysis of CppDepend but more in establishing an automated process to create the Visual Studio solution as input for CppDepend. Regardless, I found immediately a few big issues which I’m going to fix. It’s quite comfortable to fix these issues because a double-click on the Error/Warning in CppDepend opens the source file in Visual Studio.

Although I only scratched at the surface of CppDepend, the analysis of my concurrency source files impressed me. I will, therefore, invest in the future more time to better understand the various metrics of CppDepend and apply them to my other source files. My gut feeling is that I can draw many benefits from CppDepend.

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Thanks, in particular, to Jon Hess, Lakshman, Christian Wittenhorst, Sherhy Pyton, Dendi Suhubdy, Sudhakar Belagurusamy, Richard Sargeant, Rusty Fleming, John Nebel, Mipko, Alicja Kaminska, Slavko Radman, and David Poole.

My special thanks to Embarcadero
My special thanks to PVS-Studio
My special thanks to Tipi.build
My special thanks to Take Up Code
My special thanks to SHAVEDYAKS