False Positives from Antivirus Software
Many consumer-oriented antivirus products consider various low-level functionality (e.g. sharing memory between processes) suspicious. They typically have manual exceptions for commonly used browsers and office software, however they do often trigger false positives in less-mainstream software.
The following components of VisualGDB are known to trigger false positives in antivirus software:
| Component | Explanation |
| GCovServer-gcc<vesion>.exe | This executable is a part of the Live Coverage engine used for embedded projects. |
| HookEngine.dll | This library allows replacing the built-in VC++ IntelliSense with Clang IntelliSense, and the built-in C++ debugger with VisualGDB debugger for projects that require it. It is not required when using advanced project types (e.g. Advanced CMake). |
| SessionServer.exe | This executable facilitates floating licenses, that count the number of simultaneously active computers, rather than activations. The component connects to our licensing server and keeps a copy of the session key in shared memory, where multiple VisualGDB processes can access it. If you are not using a floating license, this component is not required. |
| valgrind2sprof32.exe valgrind2sprof64.exe |
These executables convert profiling and coverage reports to a binary format used by VisualGDB. They are automatically launched by VisualGDB when running profiling sessions or measuring code coverage. |
| vgagent.exe | This tool is used to send Ctrl-C and Ctrl-Break events to processes like GDB. This is required when using cross-toolchains (i.e. executables running on Windows). If absent, stopping an activa debug session will not work until it triggers a breakpoint. |
| xzdec.exe | This is a tool for decompressing the XZ compression format. It is used to unpack BSPs and other packages installed by VisualGDB. |
We do our best to contact antivirus vendors and inform them about false positives, however some antivirus products still trigger false positives on some of these components. If any of these components is missing on your computer, please try disabling your antivirus and reinstalling VisualGDB. Checking the antivirus logs/quarantine might help as well.
If your antivirus comes with a technical support, please consider forwarding the relevant executable to them so that they could add it to a manual exception list.
Another option would be to use the built-in Windows Defender, as it has a lower chance of false positives.