The Next Generation of Source Code Analysis

Automated source code analysis (SCA) technology locates and describes areas of weakness in software source code. Developers of mission-critical software are adopting SCA technology as a standard milestone of their integration build during pre-quality assurance (QA) activities. However, build-time analysis suffers from an inherent weakness: code has already been committed to a source branch, so by the time a bug is discovered it is already impacting other elements of the system.

This paper proposes a solution: moving high-quality source code analysis to the earliest point in the coding phase: the developer's desktop. This can reduce costs, lead to better QA efficiency, and improve end-products. The paper begins with an examination of the evolution of SCA, from developer desktop to integration/build and beyond, and introduces Klocwork Insight, a new SCA technology.