What's New in dotTrace 5 Performance
dotTrace 5.3 Performance supports .NET Framework 4.5 and Windows 8, enables attaching to and detaching from running processes, combines decompiling technology, integrates with Visual Studio 2012 and ReSharper 7.1.x, supports Windows Store applications profiling.
Read more below or watch this screencast to learn what's new.
Visual Studio 2012 integration
dotTrace 5.3 Performance adds integration with Visual Studio 2012. You can launch profiling sessions from within Visual Studio 2012 and navigate from a snapshot to the corresponding source code in the latest version of the Microsoft IDE. Visual Studio 2005, 2008, and 2010 are still supported, too.
Improved remote profiling
You have been able to profile .NET applications on remote machines for a while using dotTrace Performance. With version 5, remote profiling experience is substantially improved.
To start off, HTTP is now used for remote profiling instead of a custom protocol, which allows profiling over VPNs and simplifies configuring firewall rules. Also, both IPv4 and IPv6 are now supported for remote profiling.
We have also removed passphrase exchange between dotTrace and its remote agent, making remote profiling easier in restricted environments. In addition, dotTrace profiling agent can now be run either as a regular application or an ASP.NET Web Service.
Last but not least, you can finally attach to running remote processes, which is crucial in discovering bottlenecks in mission-critical production .NET applications.
Support for IIS Express
As IIS Express was gaining popularity among web developers, we've been receiving requests to enable profiling web applications running under this server, and here we go: dotTrace 5 Performance introduces official support for IIS Express that complements existing support for the full-fledged IIS and ASP.NET Development Server.
Refined stack walking mechanism
Our improved stack walking algorithm allows you to see detailed call stacks of profiled applications in more scenarios than before. Instead of the ambiguous [Native or optimized code] label, you're now able to see an expanded list of your application or CLR functions that were called during execution under profiling where it's possible.
Improvements in Plain List View
We've put a lot of effort to make Plain List a better place to examine application behavior. You can now choose to show or hide system functions from the Plain List View, and group functions by assembly in addition to class and namespace groupings.
As a bonus, Plain List is now constructed a lot faster with large snapshots, displaying up to 20x performance improvement in certain scenarios.
.NET 4.5 and Windows 8 Support
Starting from version 5.2 dotTrace Performance provides support for .NET 4.5 applications and Windows 8. It is possible to profile .NET 4.5 applications using dotTrace Performance standalone.
Profiling Windows Store applications
With version 5.3 comes support for profiling Windows Store applications including Windows Store test projects.
New filters in Hot Spots view
You can filter out system functions or event-waiting trees in the Hot Spots view to concentrate on the functions you need to investigate in a more comfortable way.
Attaching to running processes
Arguably the greatest new feature in dotTrace 5 Performance is the ability to attach the profiler to an existing .NET Framework 4.0+ process and run sampling performance analysis on it.
Oftentimes, an application that you want to optimize takes long hours or even days before it starts to display any performance issues. Previously, you would have to run it under profiling from the very start, which added another layer of performance overhead. Now, this is no longer required: with the ability to attach to a running process, you only involve the profiler when you really need it.
Integration with ReSharper 7
With dotTrace Performance, you can easily start profiling unit tests from Visual Studio code editor, Solution Explorer or ReSharper's unit test runner. Starting from version 5.1, dotTrace Performance starts to support ReSharper 7. Needless to say, it integrates with ReSharper 6 as well.
Integrated decompiler
Following ReSharper and dotPeek, JetBrains .NET assembly decompiling technology has arrived in dotTrace. While profiling an application, if you need to dig further into the code but you don't have source code or symbol information at hand, dotTrace 5 Performance will decompile it for you and present decompiled code in its source preview area for quick review.
Easier estimation of performance gains
The Adjust Time functionality that is used to estimate how optimizing a certain function affects timings of the entire snapshot has been improved as well.
Specifically, you can now clear all time adjustments on all functions visible in the current view in one step — previously you would have to navigate between adjusted functions and set them back to their actual timings one by one. We have also enabled management of time adjustments in the Overview view.
Enhancements and additions for supported frameworks
dotTrace 5 Performance ensures seamless profiling of applications that contain code targeting different CLR versions. For example, if you have a .NET Framework 4.0 application that is dependent on external libraries targeting CLR 2, this application can now be perfectly profiled.
dotTrace 5.3 Performance is a free upgrade from dotTrace 4.x Performance purchased on or after February 23, 2012.
dotTrace 4.5 Performance
June, 2011
- Integration with ReSharper 6
- Previewing .NET Framework source code
- Displaying IL code in source view
- Less noise in call stacks and improved tree presentation
- Extracting all public methods of a class to a single tab
- Improved estimation of potential performance gains
- New floating license handling policy
- Performance improvements
- Welcome Page cosmetic improvements
dotTrace 4.0 Performance
September, 2010
- Line-by-line profiling
- Remote profiling
- Instant estimation of potential performance gains
- Support for .NET Framework 4.0
- Support for Silverlight 4
- Support for .NET Compact Framework 3.5
- Two editions
- Annotating snapshots