OpenMP Updates and Fixes for C++ in Visual Studio 2019 version 16.10

Chris Pulido May 12, 2021 May 12, 2021 05/12/21

In our previous blog post about improved OpenMP support in Visual Studio, we announced the addition of the -openmp:llvm switch in Visual Studio 2019 version 16.9 to enable compiled programs to target LLVM’s OpenMP runtime library for the x64 architecture. This switch supports all the OpenMP 2.0 directives that -openmp supports, as well as ...

New Static Analysis Rule for Bounds Checking

Jordan Maples May 11, 2021 May 11, 2021 05/11/21

We have added a new experimental static analysis rule in Visual Studio 16.10 version Preview 3 - C26458, WARNING_PATH_SENSITIVE_USE_GSL_AT. The new warning is a more precise and less noisy version of warning C26446, WARNING_USE_GSL_AT. Both warnings analyse standard containers for unchecked element access and they both share the warning ...

Finding Bugs with AddressSanitizer: Patterns from Open Source Projects

Kevin Cadieux May 10, 2021 May 10, 2021 05/10/21

AddressSanitizer (ASan) was officially released in Visual Studio 2019 version 16.9. We recently used this feature to find and fix a bug in the MSVC compiler itself. To further validate the usefulness of our ASan implementation, we also used it on a collection of widely used open source projects where it found bugs in Boost, Azure IoT C SDK, ...

2x-3x Performance Improvements for Debug Builds

Pranav Kant May 7, 2021 May 7, 2021 05/7/21

We have made substantial runtime performance improvements in the x86/x64 C++ compiler for Visual Studio's default debug configuration. For Visual Studio 2019 version 16.10 Preview 2, we measure 2x - 3x speedup for programs compiled in debug mode. These improvements come from reducing the overhead introduced by runtime checks (/...

Ignoring Automatic Initialization for Code Analysis

Gabor Horvath May 6, 2021 May 6, 2021 05/6/21

Reading uninitialized memory is one of the major sources of security vulnerabilities in C and C++ programs. Microsoft developed many tools to find such errors including compiler warnings, static analysis checks, and more recently: code instrumentation.  For a more detailed overview of uninitialized memory related vulnerabilities and ...

Pure Virtual C++ 2021 is Today

Sy Brand May 3, 2021 May 3, 2021 05/3/21

Pure Virtual C++, a free one-day virtual conference for the whole C++ community, is starting today (May 3rd) at 14:30 UTC. You can watch it and interact with the speakers at Learn TV. There'll be sessions on C++20 modules, CMake, vcpkg, and code analysis. All of our pre-conference demos, including what's new in C++20 support in MSVC, ...

Pure Virtual C++ 2021 Schedule Available

Sy Brand April 20, 2021 Apr 20, 2021 04/20/21

The schedule for Pure Virtual C++ 2021 is now live on the event website. Remember to sign up to be the first to access our extra on-demand C++ demos and get more virtual surprises. Schedule All times are on Monday 3rd May 2021 UTC. Abstracts and speaker bios are available on the website...

CMake Presets integration in Visual Studio and Visual Studio Code

Erika April 20, 2021 Apr 20, 2021 04/20/21

CMakePresets.json was released in CMake 3.19 and 3.20 and allows users to specify common configure, build, and test options and share them with others. We have added support for CMakePresets.json in Visual Studio and the CMake Tools extension for Visual Studio Code. You can now invoke CMake with the same CMakePresets.json file in Visual Studio...

Visual Studio Code C++ Extension April 2021 Update: CUDA C/C++ IntelliSense and Apple Silicon Support

Julia Reid April 15, 2021 Apr 15, 2021 04/15/21

The April 2021 update of the Visual Studio Code C++ extension is now available! This latest release offers brand new features—such as IntelliSense for CUDA C/C++ and native language server support for Apple Silicon— along with a bunch of enhancements and bug fixes. To find out more about all the enhancements, check out our...

MSVC Backend Updates in Visual Studio 2019 version 16.10 Preview 2

Helena Gregg April 14, 2021 Apr 14, 2021 04/14/21

In Visual Studio 2019 version 16.10 Preview 2 we have continued to improve the C++ backend with new features, new and improved optimizations, build throughput improvements, and better security. Here is a brief list of improvements for you to review...