Coverage Data FAQ

  • Which coverage technology is supported by NDepend?
  • How to get XML Coverage Files from NCover 3.X and above?
  • How to get XML Coverage Files from JetBrains DotCover™ 1.1 and above?
  • How to get XML Coverage Files from Visual Studio™ 2017, 2015, 2013, 2012 and 2010?
  • How to provide a list of coverage files to parse during each analysis run?
  • How to import coverage data into some analysis results?



  • Which coverage technology is supported by NDepend?

    • NDepend can import coverage data from:
  • How to get XML Coverage Files from NCover 3.X and above?

    • NDepend reads NCover v3 XML format, hence if you are using NCover v4 or above, you need to export your coverage file with v3 format as explained in this NCover documentation.
    This looks like : 
    ncover export --project="MyProject" --execution="3/12/2012" --file="C:\Users\Support\Desktop\Report\coverage-export" --format=v3xml
    If you are using TestDriven.NET and/or NCoverExplorer.exe you can access folder that contains coverage file from the Explore Coverage Folder menu:



  • How to get XML Coverage Files from JetBrains DotCover™ 1.1 and above?

    • By default DotCover outputs XML coverage file. However NDepend cannot parse the default DotCover XML coverage file. You need to configure DotCover to output NDepend XML files. This can be done this way in your DotCover configuration file:

    <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
    <AnalyseParams>
      <Executable>C:\App\Bin\MyApp.exe</Executable>
      <Output>..\DotCoverCoverage.xml</Output>
      <ReportType>NDependXml</ReportType>
    </AnalyseParams>

    See also this article about using TeamCity, dotCover and NDepend, by Laurent Kempé:
    Using TeamCity integrated dotCover coverage files with NDepend


  • How to get XML Coverage Files from Visual Studio™ 2017, 2015, 2013, 2012 and 2010?

    • Visual Studio™ has 2 coverage files format.
    • A binary format where file extension is .coverage. This is the format you'll get from testing from Visual Studio or from TestDriven.NET. Alternatively you can also use the tool VSPerfMon.exe to get a .coverage file. For that you then need to instrument each assembly to cover with the tool VSInstr.exe used with the /Coverage option.
    • A XML format. (with file extension .coveragexml since VS 2010, and .xml for previous versions)
    NDepend only consumes the XML format. You can manually export XML coverage files from binary coverage files from Visual Studio with this option:


    Notice that the NDepend TFS integration comes with the two activities:
    • DownloadCoverage that gets the binary coverage file(s) from the TFS server into an input local folder
    • ImportCoverageFilesFromDir that transforms the binary coverage files (found in input local folder) into XML ones, and set these XML coverage files into the NDepend project as coverage files to import


    See the code snippet below, it takes 3 lines of code to programmatically transform a binary coverage file into a xml coverage file.
    • For that you'll need to reference from your project the assembly Microsoft.VisualStudio.Coverage.Analysis.dll:
      • A x86 version of this DLL can be found under C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio XX.0\Common7\IDE\PrivateAssemblies
      • A x64 version of this DLL can be found on x64 server where TFS is installed under C:\Program Files\Microsoft Team Foundation Server XX.0\Application Tier\TFSJobAgent\Plugins.
    • Both System.Data and System.Data.DataSetExtensions will have to be referenced as well.
    • And if you want your code to be independent from any VS or TFS install, you'll need to deploy as well Microsoft.VisualStudio.Coverage.Interop.dll that is used by Microsoft.VisualStudio.Coverage.Analysis.dll.
    using Microsoft.VisualStudio.Coverage.Analysis;
    ...
       var pathInBinary = @"C:\Dir\File.coverage";
       var pathOutXml = @"C:\Dir\File.coveragexml";

       var coverageInfo = CoverageInfo.CreateFromFile(pathInBinary);
       var data = coverageInfo.BuildDataSet();
       data.WriteXml(pathOutXml);



  • How to provide a list of coverage files to parse during each analysis run?

    • In VisualNDepend menu: Project Properties > Analysis > Code Coverage > Settings




  • How to import coverage data into some analysis results

    • In VisualStudio menu: NDepend > Coverage > Import Code Coverage Data