NDepend - THE Static Analysis-Tool for C#/.NET

For my bachlorthesis at the university of applied sciences in Bremen I was looking for a tool, which can calculate metrics from a given sourcecode. Therefore I went to Google and searched for "static analysis tool C#". A lot of results were given to me and Wikipedia holds a long list of such tools, for example FxCop, ReSharper, CodeRush, JustCode and NDepend. I downloaded all free tools for testing.
Result: only one tool was able to calculate the metrics I needed. NDepend! The rest were nice tools and Visual Studio plugins for easier refactoring.

For my bachelorthesis I primary used the analysis results from NDepend. In this article I want to give a short overview of my work with NDepend and talk about what I like about NDepend.

NDepend originally offers a great choice of metrics (http://www.ndepend.com/Metrics.aspx). There are many different kinds of metrics available at NDepend.

(big version)

Additionally - if the standard metrics don’t suffice - there is the possibility to create and calculate your own metrics with querys. The rules for the standard metrics can also be modified. Therefore these querys are included (for example you can edit the range of the metrics). With this unbounded alternatives to get relevant information about the sourcecode are given.

Beside the calculation of metrics, NDepend supports the visualisation of dependencies with graphes and matrices. I’m not able to evaluate this feature because I didn’t need it. A quick
overview allows me to say, that the dependencies between classes, assamblies and methods can be shown.

(big version)

NDepend is a very complex tool but with the right handling it offers lots of possabilities to help at the developing of big softwareprojects. The given design-goals can, espacialy in big developer groups, easily be verified and necessary adjustments can be initiated quickly. You can also implement rules for codeconventions but there are other tools, like CodeRush and ReSharper, which are better qualified to do this job. NDepend shows the rule violation not before a code analysis is done. Nevertheless I can recommend NDepend as a professional developing tool for any teamsize.