Product Reviews

Optimization the Smart Way

AQTime helps you target problem code

• By Mike Gunderloy
• 03/06/2002

Do you know which ten functions in your application account for the most time during an average run? What percentage of your code is actually visited by your test suite? Are you freeing all the memory that you allocate?

If you don't know the answer to these questions, then your toolbox is probably lacking a profiler. One excellent choice for filling that gap is AQTime, from AutomatedQA (makers of AQTest, which I reviewed in the last issue of Developer Central). If you're using Microsoft Visual C+ or Visual Basic, Borland Delphi or C++ Builder, or the gnu gcc compiler, AQTime can give you a detailed look at what's going on when you run your application.

AQTime is simple to use. Open it, load your executable application, choose a type of profiling to do (for example, a line-by-line coverage profile, or a function time profile), and hit the run button. Then use your application as you normally would, while AQTime collects the data. When you exit your application, the results are right there, with a variety of views from functional diagrams to bar charts of relative times to numeric results.

Of course AQTime also integrates with AQTest, giving you an ideal way to see whether your test suite covers all the code in your application, and integrating performance data with bug hunting. There's even an integrated source code editor so you can see just what code is contained in the problem functions.

Some applications can get away without optimization. If yours is one of those, great. If not, the cost of AQTime can easily be saved in helping you focus just on the pieces of code that need the most work in pursuit of efficiency.