How do you think in Delphi can be improve debug usability?

From: mamcx (thismail_at_notexist.com)
Date: 01/27/05 

Date: Thu, 27 Jan 2005 13:01:21 -0500

We are in a point where write code is almost fast. With color&
refactoring& put "." dude get the list of thing i feel done. But always
i read and know that debuging take the most part of the day. And i hate
debugging so much, because is very hard. So, this my list of how get a
decent debugging experience:

- Kill watch/inspect/evaluate. R.I.P on them. Let me see a simple debug
vision: Integrate all of them. Why sometimes watch a var (a simple one,
like a string) is disable in watch, but i can in Inspect or Evaluate?
Watch List is SO USELESS. Except for local variables i don't get much of
it. But Inspect is MORE USELESS. Bring the correct data but not work the
next time the code enter the method where the var exist, so close it
then inspect it again (because is tied to the adress of them, i think)

- We are in the era of XML, HTML = Massive String handling. Why i can
see ONLY A LINE of strings? Ok, in Delphi evaluate is best than VS.NET
(in fact this thread was inspired because i'm examining a XML string and
the damm tooltip window only can see the large of my monitor....).
However evaluate is so far from the real debug experience. I need bring
it. Watch is ok: Is there. But is USELESS. A string debug windows must
be a memo editor, not a TEdit. Period.

- Inspec arrays is so WRONG. A one-dimesion is ok: get a secuence list
of positions. Fine. But multi-dimesional array is hard to get, because
is listed like a one-dimensional array. Must be in a tabular format, not
a secuence format.

- Open the debug api. Inspect a dataset can be more fancy if we can see
the dataset in a readonly grid. I can happy write some inspecting code
for help me in debug my custom information.

- A button called "dump memory to file" can be very usefull sometimes. I
remember in Fox that have a command for that. Put in a nice html file a
dump of the var with full content. If take long, i can wait.

- Improve the tooltip of the debug. Hey! is almost done... Delphi 2005
provide a nice looking on methods or propierties for help. Something
like, inspecting a string, this appear when debugging:

"MyVarString:String= 'Hello World' Size=11"

Or a propierty

"TPerson.Name(Get_Name):String="Mamcx" Size=5"

What do you think? If a usefull list can be build, a QC entry can follow....

Relevant Pages

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