dependnecy

Architecture, Quality

We have all used code analysis tools on our projects and these are useful for identifying some code smells. The issue is that most of them treat metrics in isolation and isolated metrics can’t tell you if the design is good or bad. You need more context.

In this blog post we’ll see how to go beyond code smells. We’ll see how to identify design smells and inappropriate coupling in the technical architecture. We’ll define detection strategies for common design smells (like God Class and Feature Envy) and implement them using NDepend. Last but not least, we’ll see how we can define fitness functions that detect dependency violations in our application’s architecture.

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Clean Code, Quality

How do you manage dependencies in your project? Since an image speaks a thousand words, I’ve always been a fan of visual management. Unfortunately, Visual Studio Professional doesn’t provide a way to do this. In the Premium and Enterprise editions you can visualize code dependencies on dependency graphs. But I don’t think this is enough. An architectural diagram with every assembly or namespace in my solution doesn’t tell me that much. It contains too much information.

Fortunately, there is a tool that can help you manage dependencies in the .Net world: NDepend (there is also a Java port – JArchitect). NDepend is a static analysis tool that, among other things, allows you to visualize dependencies. After I first ran NDepend on a project, I was overwhelmed with information. Then I took some time to play around and discover what can it tell me about my solution. NDepend integrates into Visual Studio quite nicely and points you in the right direction through tool tips and links. This is useful for people who prefer learning by doing. Aside from giving you information, it also tells you what to do with that information.

NDepend has two main views for managing dependencies: the Dependency Graph and the Dependency Structure Matrix. Apart from these, there is also an Abstractness vs Instability report that can be helpful. In this blog post, we’ll discuss some of the things that these views can tell you about your solution.

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