Tips and Tricks

How to Query File Attributes 50x faster on Windows

By
November 14, 2024
TL;DR If your app scans thousands of files, the way you fetch file attributes can quietly destroy performance. Standard methods like GetFileAttributesEx or even std::filesystem are convenient but painfully slow at scale. By switching to faster Windows APIs like FindFirstFileEx or GetFileInformationByHandleEx , you can retrieve attributes while iterating directories, cutting expensive system…
Read more
Build Announcements

Visual Assist 2024.7 release post

By
October 1, 2024
We are excited to announce the release of 2024.7 of Visual Assist! This update introduces several powerful features aimed at improving your coding efficiency and project navigation. Download the release now. Here’s a breakdown of what’s new in this version: New…
Success StoryTips and Tricks

Making a case for investing in software tools: convincing yourself, your team, and your boss

By
September 27, 2024
Introduction Visual Assist has been a longtime partner for coding in Visual Studio. It adds missing features and sometimes even replaces the default features in the IDE. In fact, you can even argue that Visual Assist had a direct influence as to how some of the features in Visual Studio panned out. But what makes Visual Assist (VA) such a compelling purchase? And what about it makes it a…
Read more
Tips and Tricks

The biggest challenges in writing C++ programs for finance and banking

By
August 28, 2024
TL;DR C++ continues to dominate financial software because it delivers the speed, control, and precision required for high-stakes systems like trading platforms and risk engines. But building in this space is far from simple. Developers must juggle ultra-low latency demands, complex financial models, strict regulatory requirements, and the constant pressure for absolute accuracy where even the…
Read more
News

Catching up with VA: Our most recent performance updates

By
July 21, 2024
Throughout its long lifetime, Visual Assist (VA) has been a top-of-the-line productivity plugin with a performance advantage over Visual Studio and other plugins. Performance and speed has been a bread-and-butter factor for choosing VA—and we’ve doubled down with updates focused on cutting interruptions and load times. VA had significant improvements in 2024, particularly in the initial…
Read more
%d