[feature] MSBuildDeps generator: CAExcludePath

In most cases if one wants to run the code analysis included in Visual Studio, one is not interested in findings in external code.

This is possible via the (poorly documented) CAExcludePath property, see e.g. https://stackoverflow.com/questions/43755499/suppress-warnings-for-external-headers-in-vs2017-code-analysis.

It would be nice if the MSBuildDeps generator could populate the CAExcludePath with the include paths of the dependencies.

Depending on how well the visual_studio/visual_studio_multi generators are still maintained, consider adding it there too.

Note that the few examples usages I found on the internet with a quick search seem to have the property under a <PropertyGroup Condition="'$(Language)'=='C++'"> group. A quick test suggest this is not needed, e.g. if I manually modify conan_boost.props to

...
<PropertyGroup>
	<LocalDebuggerEnvironment>PATH=%PATH%;$(ConanboostBinaryDirectories)$(LocalDebuggerEnvironment)</LocalDebuggerEnvironment>
	<DebuggerFlavor>WindowsLocalDebugger</DebuggerFlavor>
	<CAExcludePath>$(ConanboostIncludeDirectories);$(CAExcludePath)</CAExcludePath>
</PropertyGroup>
...

the exclude seems to works fine.

[lieser]

Thanks a lot for adding this this fast.

Did a quick test configuring it using profiles, and seems to works as expected. As we currently do not use the generate method in our recipes, I did not yet test setting the exclude_code_analysis property in a recipe instead of the profile.

Do I see it correctly that the [conf] settings can currently not be directly set via an argument then calling e.g. conan install, but instead always have to be in a profile or the global config?

[memsharded]

Thanks for the feedback @lieser

Based on the discussion, the approach should be:

• Lets leave as-is by default. Code-analysis, same as compiler warnings should always be enabled by default. It is clear that there is no unique absolute default, users using Conan mostly for third-parties will want those excluded, but most users using Conan for their own packages, including header-only, will want them included.
• Users can opt-out in recipes:

  def generate(self):
        msbuilddeps = MSBuildDeps(self)
        msbuilddeps.exclude_code_analysis = ["*"]  # we could define a ``True`` meaning "all", just the idea
  

• This behavior can also be configured downstream by users, overriding the declared behavior

  [conf]
  tools.msbuild.msbuilddeps:exclude_code_analysis = False  # or True, or different patterns
  

  All the [conf] behavior can also applied selective to particular packages so mypkg:tools.msbuild.... is also possible.