Best practices for shifting left with SonarQube for IDE

Time to complete icon5 minutes to complete

Overview

This course outlines best practices for shifting left by using SonarQube for IDE, which allows you to analyze your code as it's being written.

Learning objectives

After completing this course, you’ll be able to:

  • Define the main functions of SonarQube for IDE.
  • Outline the features of Connected Mode.
  • List additional best practices for setting up SonarQube for IDE.

Key topics

  • Principle of shift left
  • Connected Mode
  • Best practices for configuring SonarQube for IDE

Target audience

  • Developers
  • DevOps engineers
  • Engineering leaders

Prerequisites

Access to an IDE supported by SonarQube for IDE:

  • Visual Studio, VS Code, Eclipse (including customizations like CDT, IDz/RDz, and Topaz)
  • The JetBrains family (IntelliJ, Rider, CLion, PyCharm, PHPStorm, and WebStorm)
  • AI-native editors built on the VS Code architecture, such as Cursor, Windsurf, Trae, and GitPod
  • For developers using AI agents with tools like Cursor or Codex, Sonar capabilities can be enabled via the Sonar MCP Server.