Build pipeline is reporting warnings for files that are configured as exclusions

[StingyJack (Andrew Stanton)]

I have exclusions configured in a sonarcloud project, and an Azure Devops CI pipeline that looks like this

… which I believe is the correct arrangement of tasks WRT sonar.

One of the exclusions for analysis is **\*.Tests\**\*.cs (to avoid analyzing unit tests). When I submit a PR and the CI build is triggered, dozens of S**** (sonar analysis) warnings are being emitted during the MsBuild step for files that match the exclusion pattern.

When the pipeline is complete and results uploaded to sonar, there are no issues that correspond to those build warnings in the sonarcloud UI. This tells me that the configuration is correct and is matching and excluding files that I intend it to.

Why is the msbuild task not also doing the same?

[Colin]

Hey Andrew.

Exclusions are only taken into account during the Run Code Analysis step, not during the build when the Roslyn analyzers are run. Hopefully we’ll improve on that this year.

@Andrei_Epure

We have this on our internal roadmap to improve (i.e. treat exclusions in the Roslyn analyzer, not when importing the Roslyn results after the build).

[StingyJack (Andrew Stanton)]

Is there any way to avoid generating all these build warnings?

[Colin]

Only if you exclude the whole project from analysis (for example, in the test project’s .csproj file)

Excluded folders are still being analysed in msbuild step

Hey there. sonar.exclusions does not affect the MSBuild step itseelf – only the “end” step of the Scanner for .NET. You can prevent the analyzers from running at all during the build adding this to the relevant .csproj file(s). <!-- in .csproj --> <PropertyGroup> <!-- Exclude the project from analysis --> <SonarQubeExclude>true</SonarQubeExclude> </PropertyGroup> There’s also an interesting solution proposed in this StackOverflow post to systematically apply this setting based on a RegEx. …

[StingyJack (Andrew Stanton)]

@Colin

exclude the whole project from analysis

means I cant have rules like this one.

[Colin]

I thought your goal was to not analyze unit tests?

@StingyJack

One of the exclusions for analysis is **\*.Tests\**\*.cs (to avoid analyzing unit tests).

[StingyJack (Andrew Stanton)]

@Colin

I thought your goal was to not analyze unit tests?

No, the goal was to have the S warnings not show up for files that are marked as exclusions. I could have picked an exclusion for **\Program.cs, in neither case would I want to exclude the whole project.

[Colin]

Unfortunately, for now, you won’t be able to suppress the warnings unless you exclude the unit test project entirely or disable the rule(s) in your Quality Profile. Hopefully this improves in the future.

[StingyJack (Andrew Stanton)]

dang.=<

Did nobody notice dozens of incorrect warnings being emitted from a build?

EDIT: @Colin_SonarSource - if we changed this property on the “Prepare Analysis” task to “Use standalone scanner” instead of integrate with MSBuild, would we get the same quality results reported but without the build warnings?

[Andrei_Epure]

@StingyJack

EDIT: @Colin_SonarSource - if we changed this property on the “Prepare Analysis” task to “Use standalone scanner” instead of integrate with MSBuild, would we get the same quality results reported but without the build warnings?

Hello @StingyJack

If you want to analyze .NET code (C# or VB .NET), you need to integrate with MSBuild.