Comments on: Hey, Don’t Dump. Debug! http://www.linux-mag.com/id/7319/ Open Source, Open Standards Sat, 05 Oct 2013 13:48:18 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.1 By: grdetil http://www.linux-mag.com/id/7319/#comment-6381 grdetil Wed, 30 Nov -0001 00:00:00 +0000 http://www.linux-mag.com/id/7319/#comment-6381 As a user and advocate of trace prints for debugging, here is why I think they remain a popular strategy. When you learn to program in a language, one of the first things you learn is how to get data out of the program. So, it's a tool that's always in the forefront of your mind when programming and debugging.<br /> <br /> On the other hand, debuggers tend to be specific to a single OS and/or language, with a large set of arcane and cryptic commands that you need to learn on top of the language. And moving from one debugger to another is often more mind-warping than moving from one language to another. In the younger days of Unix, I had gotten to know a few tricks in db and adb, only to find that knowledge of no use in gdb on Linux. So, I've learned how to get a backtrace in gdb, only so I can more precisely target my trace prints by narrowing down the point of failure. I have yet to learn much more than that in gdb or any other recent debugger. As a user and advocate of trace prints for debugging, here is why I think they remain a popular strategy. When you learn to program in a language, one of the first things you learn is how to get data out of the program. So, it’s a tool that’s always in the forefront of your mind when programming and debugging.

On the other hand, debuggers tend to be specific to a single OS and/or language, with a large set of arcane and cryptic commands that you need to learn on top of the language. And moving from one debugger to another is often more mind-warping than moving from one language to another. In the younger days of Unix, I had gotten to know a few tricks in db and adb, only to find that knowledge of no use in gdb on Linux. So, I’ve learned how to get a backtrace in gdb, only so I can more precisely target my trace prints by narrowing down the point of failure. I have yet to learn much more than that in gdb or any other recent debugger.

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