About the Client
Based in Europe, the client is a global company specializing in the development and manufacturing of high-performance systems for vehicle technology. As a company that has been in the industry for over a century, their longstanding focus on innovation has positioned them as one of the top automotive manufacturers worldwide. As part of their commitment to quality, they have invested heavily in simulation tools for vehicle design, testing, and validation, ensuring efficiency and reliability for their partner manufacturers.
They engineer and produce various automotive technologies such as engine and electronics systems for passenger cars, commercial vehicles, and data measurement services.
Use case and challenges
We had the privilege of speaking with the lead developer and his team who create modeling and simulation software. We discussed their daily work and the challenges they face:
Use Cases:
- They develop C++ applications in Microsoft’s Visual Studio for internal use.
- They create bespoke programs for modeling components and simulating them in various scenarios.
- Their primary language is using C/C++ in Visual Studio because it can be interfaced easily.
Challenges:
- As an advanced tech provider, their workflow and output is highly specialized. Each project is tailor-made specifically for a certain client or customer.
- They have huge legacy code bases that they have to maintain and modernize.
- Because of the precision involved in measurements, they handle large amounts of data from different sources of measurement.
Solution
Visual Assist was introduced to the team many years ago and it has since been a staple tool used daily by the developer team. They use Visual Assist for a variety of use cases including:
- Refactoring and modernizing code is exponentially faster.
Because their toolchain was initially built sometime in the 60’s, they had a lot of code modernization and translation projects. Then they also had to integrate them with new tools and update them to the latest coding standards.
Visual Assist’s refactoring feature has been an indispensable asset in updating the outdated code structures, making them more readable, memory-safe, and maintainable. It takes the pain out of manually bringing legacy or deprecated code up to standard by automatically renaming variables or extracting methods, reducing the risk of introducing errors during manual updates. This includes refactoring to use modern, secure and safe coding styles. Effectively Visual Assist simplifies their C++ code maintenance so that they can focus on manufacturing and designing parts, not code. - Navigating old code and huge projects happens in a single click.
Visual Assist greatly helps the team get around their huge legacy projects with smart navigation features. Finding and searching for certain sections of code is a cumbersome ordeal that VA just completely skips over with features like Find References, Find Symbols, the various Go To functions, and the like. - Snappier performance on large projects and solutions.
When it comes to handling large amounts of data, Visual Assist’s optimized startup speed and low memory footprint provides the team snappy and accurate code assistance. Due to the repetitive nature of their projects, the few seconds that Visual Assist saves compounds over time and can boost productivity by as much as 20%.
This non-exhaustive list is a testament to how Visual Assist can save hundreds of hours of valuable productivity time by providing smart suggestions, speedy features, and a satisfying experience for the Visual Studio IDE.
Interested?
Interested in getting the same benefits you or your team? Visual Assist is free to try for thirty days.
Whether you’re looking to boost your team’s productivity or optimizing your own development process, now’s the perfect time to upgrade your toolkit with one of the most trusted Visual Studio plugins. Click on the link below to learn more about Visual Assist.
Frequently Asked Questions: Visual Assist for Automotive C++ Development
1. What is Visual Assist and how does it help C++ developers?
Visual Assist is a productivity plugin designed to enhance C++ development inside Microsoft Visual Studio. It helps developers navigate large codebases, refactor legacy code, and work faster with intelligent code understanding, especially in complex and long-lived projects.
2. Why do automotive software teams rely heavily on C++?
Automotive software demands high performance, precise control over memory, and deterministic behavior, which makes C++ a preferred language. In modeling and simulation environments, C++ enables close integration with hardware-level systems, real-time simulations, and high-volume data processing required for vehicle validation and testing.
3. How does Visual Assist help with legacy C++ code modernization?
Visual Assist simplifies modernizing legacy C++ code by automating refactoring tasks such as renaming variables, extracting methods, and improving code structure. This reduces the risk of human error while updating decades-old codebases to meet modern coding standards, safety requirements, and maintainability expectations.
4. Can Visual Assist handle very large C++ projects?
Yes. Visual Assist is optimized for large-scale C++ projects with millions of lines of code. Its fast navigation, low memory footprint, and efficient parsing allow teams to move through complex solutions quickly without the performance slowdowns commonly experienced in standard IDE setups.
5. How does Visual Assist improve productivity in simulation and modeling software?
In simulation-heavy environments, developers frequently navigate repetitive code patterns and large datasets. Visual Assist reduces friction by enabling instant symbol searches, reference lookups, and faster code comprehension. Over time, these small time savings compound, significantly improving overall development productivity.
6. Is Visual Assist suitable for highly specialized, custom-built software?
Yes. Visual Assist is particularly valuable for bespoke software projects where code is tailored for specific clients or systems. Its deep understanding of C++ syntax and project structure allows developers to work efficiently even in non-standard or highly customized code environments.
7. How does Visual Assist help teams working with large volumes of data?
Visual Assist maintains fast response times even when working with data-intensive projects. Its optimized startup speed and intelligent indexing ensure developers can quickly access relevant code sections without delays, which is critical when simulation accuracy and performance are essential.
8. Does Visual Assist reduce errors during refactoring?
Yes. Manual refactoring in large C++ projects often introduces subtle bugs. Visual Assist minimizes this risk by applying refactoring changes consistently across the entire codebase, helping maintain correctness while improving readability, safety, and long-term maintainability.
9. Why is code navigation so important in long-lived automotive projects?
Automotive software projects often span decades and multiple development teams. Efficient code navigation is essential for understanding inherited logic, tracing dependencies, and safely making updates. Visual Assist enables developers to instantly locate symbols, references, and definitions, saving hours of manual searching.
10. Is Visual Assist worth using for professional engineering teams?
For professional engineering teams working on complex C++ systems, Visual Assist is often considered essential. It allows developers to focus on designing and validating automotive systems rather than wrestling with tooling limitations, making it a strong productivity investment for serious development workflows.
