# PVS\-Studio and GitHub community: let the friendship begin Some time ago it was decided to make PVS\-Studio static code analyzer free for certain categories of developers: students for educational purposes, individual developers and teams of enthusiasts\. Gradually the number of free users increases, but we decided to remind about this possibility because some developers might have missed this news\. ![0474_GitHub_Friendship/image1.png](https://import.viva64.com/docx/blog/0474_GitHub_Friendship/image1.png) So, it all started with the article: [How to use PVS\-Studio for free](https://pvs-studio.com/en/blog/posts/0457/)\. The first reaction of users was quite controversial\. On the one hand, individual developers were happy to use the tool for free, but on the other hand we faced with discontent about the required comments in the code\. Initially there was no secret that the proposed comments would not fit everybody, and that was the point in all that\. As we have already mentioned in the previous news posts, if none of the variants of free use fits, we suggest discussing the idea of [purchasing the license](https://pvs-studio.com/en/order/)\. Now we decided to monitor how you a free version of PVS\-Studio will be distributed among the GitHub community\. To do this, we contacted those [GitHub](https://github.com/) developers who are already using the free version of our analyzer\. Perhaps, having read a few reviews, some developers might want to begin using the analyzer in the development of their projects\. ![0474_GitHub_Friendship/image3.png](https://import.viva64.com/docx/blog/0474_GitHub_Friendship/image3.png) As you can see on the screenshot, there are not that many people, using PVS\-Studio yet\. But the number continues gradually growing\. Let's have a look at some reviews of these users\. ## What people say about us Below you will find some reviews from GitHub developers who use the free version of PVS\-Studio\. **Evgeniy Lepikhin \(**[**TrafficProcessor**](https://github.com/johnlepikhin/TrafficProcessor)** project\):** _I don't write in C\+\+ much, and I use static code analyzers even less \(there aren't many working under Linux\)\. In comparison with lint, your analyzer was easily installed and was effortlessly integrated in the IDE\. I cannot say much regarding the quality of the analyzer itself\- I don't have much experience in that\. But it works, doesn't glitch and it's_ _already_ _enough\._ **Alexey Schadin \(**[**NppKate**](https://github.com/schadin/NppKate)** project\):** _ In general I am satisfied with the work of the analyzer, thanks to PVS\-Studio team for their work\. Unfortunately my project is very small; before that buy used analysis that is done by MS Visual Studio 2015 that's why the list of potentially troublesome places was very small \(less than 10 items\)\. I also liked the interface looking at the description of the warning it's clear how to correct the error\. Thank you for making Open Source products better\! I will also use this tool and other open source projects if the policy of the company doesn't_ _change\._ We should issue Alex and other developers that our company is not going to change that policy in the nearest future \- the free version is a long\-term project\. **Sergey Zhejgurov \(**[**ToolsGenGkode**](https://github.com/selenur/ToolsGenGkode)** project\):** _I am very pleased with your program especially with the ability to use it without the need to buy it, because_ _programming_ _in_ _C\#_ _is_ _just_ _my_ _hobby_ _and_ _purchasing_ _the_ _license_ _would_ _be_ _not_ _expedient_ _for_ _me\._ _However,_ _finding_ _bugs_ _is_ _very_ _useful_ _due_ _to_ _my_ _lack_ _of_ _experience_ _C\#\._ _I_ _am_ _very_ _happy_ _that_ _your_ _company_ _made_ _it_ _possible_ _to_ _use_ _the_ _program_ _for_ _free_ _:\-\)_ **Alibek Omarov \(cs16\-client project\):** _ I have long been following the news of PVS\-Studio and took part in the beta testing of the analyzer for Linux\. I am "Chuffed to bits"\._ _The_ _tool_ _does_ _its_ _work_ _looking_ _for_ _context_ _typos_ _and_ _does_ _it_ _really_ _well\._ _The_ _free_ _license_ _was_ _very_ _helpful_ _to_ _me_ _because_ _I_ _am_ _an_ _individual_ _developer_ _and_ _moreover_ _an_ _amateur_ _developer\._ **Alexey Lesovskij \(**[**pgcenter**](https://github.com/lesovsky/pgcenter)** project\):** _Yes, I use PVS\-Studio in my project because I am not a professional developer but more of a system administrator, that's why I tend to make many unobvious mistakes\. When programming, PVS\-Studio points to the bugs and I try to correct using those recommendations that are given on the website\._ _To_ _my_ _mind,_ _PVS\-Studio_ _is_ _a_ _very_ _useful_ _tool_ _that_ _allows_ _correcting_ _bugs_ _in_ _the_ _code_ _and_ _helps_ _a_ _developer_ _to_ _improve_ _the_ _coding_ _skills\._ _It's_ _very_ _easy_ _to_ _use_ _PVS\-Studio,_ _the_ _setting,_ _analysis_ _understanding_ _of_ _the_ _warnings_ _is_ _not_ _hard_ _at_ _all\._ Although, it would be unfair to cite only positive feedback in this article\. We take constructive criticism normally, and that's why we would like to share one more review\. **Grigoriev Vitaliy \- network application security specialist** says: _I have being using your tool to work for several years and wrote to you several times about the bugs and flaws I found in it \._ _It_ _seems_ _to_ _me_ _that_ _you_ _have_ _chosen_ _an_ _incorrect_ _way_ _of_ _providing_ _the_ _tool_ _to_ _the_ _users\._ _Your_ _approach_ _has_ _several_ _disadvantages\._ _The_ _first_ _is_ _everything_ _depends_ _on_ _the_ _honesty_ _of_ _the_ _developers_ _and_ _the_ _license_ _agreement\._ _It's_ _impossible_ _in_ _the_ _Russian_ _conditions\._ _Another \- you have no ability to check whether the project is open source or not \._ _One more point \- how are you going to promote your tool among the programmers if you want to attract foreign programmers, but the "advertisement" is hidden inside the code? You must promote your analyzer among large projects on GitHub; but even those large programs that are absolutely free will not agree to add any comments to their files\._ _I suggest having a look at the way Soverity Scan does their advertisement \- they have a website for using the tool for free and complete integration with various repositories \.\.\. Integration with Travis\-CI and so on\. In addition to this is the advertisement as a README tag that everybody sees\. Such an approach excludes all the disadvantages provided above\. That's why Coverity is used in every other project on Git\. Also, I_ _think_ _you_ _have_ _already_ _considered_ _such_ _a_ _variant_ _but_ _for_ _some_ _reason_ _didn't_ _decide_ _to_ _do_ _this\._ _This_ _is_ _probably_ _because_ _your_ _action_ _is_ _temporary_ _or_ _due_ _to_ _the_ _expenses_ _for_ _the_ _development_ _of_ _a_ _new_ _website\._ _One more minus is that you write very long, but not very complete settings manuals \(for example integration to a build system Cmake in Linux and so on\.\) They have very few user cases and practical components\. The number of various projects is really large and they get built differently but the examples examples are given for one or two simplest cases\.\.\._ _If you made your extension for CLion but not using other approaches \- that would be very useful\. Almost all the companies that develop programs for Linux have switched it to CLion and the number of people who are still using "Vim and the analogues" is decreasing\. In general I recommend having a look at the products by JetBrains to be exact by TeamCity and YouTrack\. These are tools that are used by almost ALL large_ _and_ _medium_ _sized_ _companies_ _and_ _the_ _integration_ _of_ _PVS\-Studio_ _there_ _will_ _be_ _a_ _very_ _correct_ _Business_ _model\._ Thanks, Vitaliy, for such a detailed review but still, there are some moments we need to comment\. 1. A free version of PVS\-Studio is not a temporary action, it is done permanently\. We're happy that we can help enthusiastic developers to use a commercial product for free\. 1. Yes, Coverity is an example for us and we try to follow it: this company is really an authority for us\. However, we decided to take another way regarding the free license\.The thing is that we want to make a free license not only for open source projects\. And and there is some advantage for developers\. Yes we won't be able to check the honesty of a developer but those companies that respect themselves, won't be using cheating methods and those who will, aren't our clients anyway\. 1. Speaking about CLion\. PVS\-Studio for Linux appeared quite recently, and we've done the integration of the analyzer through a CMake project file \([this](https://pvs-studio.com/en/docs/manual/0036/) is how it looks and is configured\)\. We are considering now an ability to release an extension for the IDE\. ## Conclusion We would like to thank all the developers that gave us the feedback\. We were very pleased to talk to them and get the positive opinions\. In general we're quite happy about the feedback we got\. Despite a negative reaction in the beginning, the developers are now taking advantage of using a free version of PVS\-Studio\. We think that this is the beginning of our friendship with the GitHub community\. You are welcome to join\. We suggest downloading and trying PVS\-Studio for [free](https://pvs-studio.com/en/blog/posts/0457/) on your project\. Let's be friends\! If you have any questions regarding this setting integration and using PVS\-Studio you may always [contact us](https://pvs-studio.com/en/about-feedback/)\. We always try to help the developers fight against bugs\.