VSSDK010 Remove unnecessary ProvideAutoLoad attribute

Automatically loading a package has a performance cost. A package that only registers services, code expansions, or other declarative contributions does not need to load unless it overrides Package.Initialize, AsyncPackage.InitializeAsync, or AsyncPackage.OnAfterPackageLoadedAsync.

This analyzer reports each ProvideAutoLoad attribute on a package when neither the package nor an intermediate base class overrides an applicable initialization method.

Example of a pattern that is flagged by this analyzer

using Microsoft.VisualStudio.Shell;

[ProvideAutoLoad("{F184B08F-C81C-45F6-A57F-5ABD9991F28F}", PackageAutoLoadFlags.BackgroundLoad)]
[PackageRegistration(UseManagedResourcesOnly = true, AllowsBackgroundLoading = true)]
class MyPackage : AsyncPackage
{
}

Solution

Remove the ProvideAutoLoad attribute. Visual Studio can consume the package's declarative registrations without loading the package.

using Microsoft.VisualStudio.Shell;

[PackageRegistration(UseManagedResourcesOnly = true, AllowsBackgroundLoading = true)]
class MyPackage : AsyncPackage
{
}

If the package needs to run initialization code, override Initialize or InitializeAsync as appropriate instead of removing ProvideAutoLoad. An AsyncPackage may also override OnAfterPackageLoadedAsync for operations with side effects that should run soon after package loading rather than as a strict part of initialization.