How can I get a visual representation of my solution's dependency chain and member hooks?

Question

I've been tasked with researching some .NET code that isn't mine. It's a little hard to figure out because there are so many hooks in different areas. In other words, everything seems to be very highly coupled.

I'd like to be able to do the following:

1. Very easily see a hierarchical (tree) view of projects and their direct dependencies (not just references)

2. Be able to easily (visually) trace specific API hooks back from a dependent class to it's dependency. For example: If ProjectA.ClassA.Method1() has a call to ProjectB.ClassB.Method2() within the method, I want to be able to see it

And hey, maybe visually isn't the best way to go. But it seems to always work better for me that way. I'll take any and all suggestions of course.

Answer 1

NDepend is awesome for this sort of thing. It's a little pricey, but you can get quite far with the free trial.