Install Visual Studio Code IDE and extensions

Visual Studio Code is the lightweight IDE from Microsoft.

Install Visual Studio Code

To install Visual Studio Code,

• Download Visual Studio Code .

• Install it.

For more information on Visual Studio Code,

• Call the menu Help > Documentation: or

• Visit the Getting Started page.

Install the recommended extensions

Visual Studio Code is based on extensions.

To install an extension using the command line:

code --install-extension ms-vscode.cpptools

To install an extension using the IDE:

• Call the menu View > Extensions or press Ctrl+Shift+X.

• Type the name of the extension to search it.

• Select the extension and click on Install.

Note

If emCode is used on Windows Sub-system for Linux, the extensions may need to be installed on both the Windows and the Linux environments. Visual Studio Code provides accurate recommendations.

Install the extensions for C/C++

	Extension	Name
	C/C++	ms-vscode.cpptools
	IntelliCode	VisualStudioExptTeam.vscodeintellicode
	Better C++ Syntax	jeff-hykin.better-cpp-syntax

Install the extensions to check the code

	Extension	Name
	C/C++ Advanced Lint for Visual Studio Code	jbenden.c-cpp-flylint
	Multilingual, Offline and Lightweight Spellchecker	ban.spellright
	Shortcut Menu Bar	jerrygoyal.shortcut-menu-bar
	Icons	vscode-icons-team.vscode-icons
	Workspace Storage Cleanup	mehyaa.workspace-storage-cleanup
	Visible Whitespace	yoshi389111.visible-whitespace

The C/C++ Advanced Lint manages different static analysers as CLang, CppCheck, FlawFinder and Lizard.

For download and documentation, please refer to

• CLang ;

• CppCheck ;

• FlawFinder ;

• Lizard .

The Multilingual, Offline and Lightweight Spellchecker uses the dictionaries located at ~/.config/Code/Dictionaries, with default installed dictionary American English .

To use other dictionaries,

• Download Google Chrome dictionaries with .bdic extension from chromium/deps/hunspell_dictionaries .

• Link system dictionaries located at /usr/share/hunspell/ with .dic and .aff extensions with

  ln -s /usr/share/hunspell/* ~/.config/Code/Dictionaries
  

Visual Studio Code generates temporary files for each project. The Workspace Storage Cleanup extension manages them to save space.

Install the extensions to format the code

The C/C++ extension includes a formatter. As an option, Artistic Style provides more parameters.

	Extension	Name
	Artistic Style Format	chiehyu.vscode-astyle

Artistic Style is a utility to indent, format and improve the presentation of the code.

The Artistic Style extension requires the prior installation of Artistic Style.

For download and documentation,

• Please refer to Artistic Style .

Artistic Style reads the ~/.astylerc file for the parameters to use.

For more information about the format options,

• Please refer to the Documentation page on the Artistic Style website.

Install the extensions to generate documentation

	Extension	Name
	Doxygen Documentation Generator	cschlosser.doxdocgen

The Doxygen extension provides tools to generate the documentation. It requires the prior installation of Doxygen and optionally, GraphViz to generate graphs and LaTex to generate PDFs.

Doxygen generates all the help files based on comments added to the code. Output formats are HTML and LaTeX. Doxygen includes DoxyWizard, a GUI for an easy tweaking of the parameters. Doxygen requires Graphviz to draw elaborate dependency trees.

Finally, TeXShop translates the generated Doxygen LaTeX files into a PDF document.

For download and documentation, please refer to

• Doxygen ;
• GraphViz ;
• LaTeX ;
• TeXShop .

Install the extensions to debug

	Extension	Name
	Cortex Debug	marus25.cortex-debug
	Debug Tracker	mcu-debug.debug-tracker-vscode
	RTOS View	mcu-debug.rtos-views
	Memory View	mcu-debug.memory-view
	Peripheral Viewer	mcu-debug.peripheral-viewer

The Cortex Debug extension works with Segger J-Link, OpenOCD, STM32CubeProgrammer ST-Link and Texane ST-Util as GDB servers. The MCU-Debug extensions add services to the Cortex Debug extension.

The Cortex Debug extension requires the prior installation of J-Link, OpenOCD, ST-Link and Texane ST-Util.

For download and documentation, please refer to

• Segger J-Link ;

• OpenOCD ;

• STMicroelectronic ST-Link , part of STM32CubeProgrammer;

• Texane ST-Util .

The Segger J-Link probe may need

nano 99-segger-vcom.rules

ACTION!="add", SUBSYSTEM!="usb_device", GOTO="segger_rules_end"
ATTRS{idVendor}=="1366" ENV{ID_MM_DEVICE_IGNORE}="1"
#ATTRS{idVendor}=="1366" ATTRS{idProduct}=="0105", ENV{ID_MM_DEVICE_IGNORE}="1"
LABEL="segger_rules_end"

Save and close with Ctrl+O Ctrl+X

sudo su

chown root 99-segger-vcom.rules
chmod u=rw 99-segger-vcom.rules
chmod a+r 99-segger-vcom.rules
ls -l 99-segger-vcom.rules
cp 99-segger-vcom.rules /etc/udev/rules.d/99-segger-vcom.rules
udevadm control --reload-rules
exit

And, if JLinkGDBServer complains about missing libraries,

sudo apt install libncursesw5

The Cortex Debug extension requires a modern GDB client, version 9 or later. Some boards packages include older versions of the GDB client.

sudo apt update
sudo apt install gdb-multiarch

For more information on the Cortex Debug extension,

• Please refer to the Cortex-Debug wiki.

Install the extensions for Windows Sub-system for Linux

The Windows Sub-system for Linux runs a Linux distribution in Windows. This option is faster and more stable than other options like MinGW, Cygwin or MSYS2.

	Extension	Name
	Visual Studio Code Remote – SSH	ms-vscode-remote.remote-ssh
	Visual Studio Code Remote – WSL	ms-vscode-remote.remote-wsl
	USBIP Connect	thecreativedodo.usbip-connect

For more information on WSL, please refer to

• Windows Subsystem for Linux Documentation ;
• Install Linux on Windows with WSL ;
• Visual Studio Code WSL extension;
• Developing in WSL with Visual Studio Code.

The USBIP Connect extension allows WSL to access USB devices connected to the computer.

It requires the installation of two utilities.

• usbipd-win shares connected USD devices with WSL; and optionally
• WSL USB Manager provides a GUI interface for usbipd-win.

To attach a USB device to WSL,

On Windows,

• Launch WSL USB Manager;
• Identify the COM port of the board;
• Select it and click on Bound;
• Select it again and click on Attach.

The selected port now appears under the Forwarded Devices list, and is available on the WSL-hosted Linux distribution, albeit with limited authorisations.

On the WSL-hosted Linux distribution,

• Open a Terminal window;

ls -all /dev/ttyACM0 
crw-rw---- 1 root dialout 166, 0 Jun 26 13:20 /dev/ttyACM0

• Change the authorisation of the USB device to allow read and write, as it is protected by default.

sudo chmod 666 /dev/ttyACM0
ls -all /dev/ttyACM0 
crw-rw-rw- 1 root dialout 166, 0 Jun 26 13:20 /dev/ttyACM0

For more information on connecting USB devices to WSL, please refer to

• Connect USB devices ;
• USBIP Connect ;
• How to use usbipd-win ;
• WSL USB Manager Usage .

The USB devices need to be declared on WSL as with any other standard Linux installation.

Update Visual Studio Code

Update IDE

Visual Studio Code checks itself for updates. Alternatively,

• Call the menu Help > Check for updates….

Update extensions

Visual Studio Code checks itself for updates. Alternatively,

• Call the prompt Ctrl+Shift+P and then enter Extensions: Check for Extension Updates.