At the moment I am working on an ubuntu machine with vscode installed. There is a new thing out there where your IDE can run a container that features all dev tools you want so that when you move from machine to machine you can take your dev envirnment and all the tools with you.

I want to find out how to do that for C++ so here is writeup while I do that. Step one is finding someone who did this already - you can find sites I read linked below.

Here are the steps I followed

1. Get a coffee while remembering that I have all prerequisits. docker and vscode already installed. (docker, vscode, plugin for docker, plugin for Remote - Containers)
2. Clone the demo repo git@github.com:microsoft/vscode-remote-try-cpp.git
3. navigat to the folder and open it vscode .
4. click the lower left gren dev container icon and select Remote-Containers: Open Folder in Container
5. click the run and debug button on the left.
6. profit

Summary

Especially when you have your basic tools installed. Starting up a project that was checkd in like the c++ sample is a breeze. Checking in the the .devcontainer and the .vscode folders seems imperative in order to get a smooth experience.

Introducing an error like 1++; shows the appropriate compiler warning in the Problem section of vscode.

Autocompletion works for c++ keywords like double, for functions in the same file, for standard libraries and that is how far my testing went for now.

cmake and python 2.7.16 are installed in the container.

Things I will look into later

Introducing a core community guideline problem like int arr[10]; does not show up as an issue.

Setting up conan (pip and conan are not installed).

Setting up testing.

Things I read while reseaching the topic:

• Developing inside a Container
• #VSCode: C++ Development and Debugging using containers
• Using VS Code for C++ development with containers
• VS Code Remote / GitHub Codespaces Container Definitions
• Try Out Development Containers: C++