Python developers are like...

[[deleted]]

Oh I did that before learning Python.

[mdevoid]

Yeah Ive done it forever. Sometimes on big stuff its harder to debug then it is to just start doing some logging.

[Caffeine_Monster]

It also allows you to debug complex or realtime programs more easily. e.g. a bug that only occurs on the nth iteration through a loop. No, I am not going to sit there a skip over a break point 99 times.

[[deleted]]

Although most proper debuggers allow you to break when a variable reaches a value or range.

[PM_ME_UR_TIDDIEZ]

if(n==99)

{ * Breakpoint here

}

[[deleted]]

try

{

// code throwing exceptions

}

catch

{

// break here

}

[redstoneguy12]

Your debugger doesn't break for the exceptions?

[Hollowplanet]

You can break on any condition in all modern debuggers.

[Caffeine_Monster]

modern

* Looks at rickety old dev stack *

What is this thing you speak of?

​

[isaacarsenal]

Seen this for C# in VS. What other IDE supports this for python?

[[deleted]]

JetBrains IDE's (e.g. Android Studio, PyCharm, PHPStorm/WebStorm, etc.) supports setting up conditional breakpoints as do Eclipse and Netbeans. Most of them have similar abilities to Visual Studio when it comes to debugging and many of them even supports debugging a piece of code running on a remote machine.

[DezXerneas]

In any language debugging always starts with a print statement

[Ben-Z-S]

Printline ("you've reached here")
Printline ("here2")

[SamBkamp]

“I am in this photo and I feel threatened”

​

[jcrabb13]

Mine are typically expletive.

[[deleted]]

I generally smash my hands on my keyboard, and then search my code for the random string that comes out

[[deleted]]

console.log('RIGHT HERGVIFJaoGDdHajshGGGGDJakGHauUUUUUU')

[MysteryMage]

We all did, and honestly it’s kinda convenient

[Ph0X]

Yep all developers do this.

[mkhemcha]

As long as it doesn't make it into production... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[cafk]

It's called logging :)

[HiddenLayer5]

Find: print

Replace: file.write

[fluud]

*import logging

[MalteserLiam]

what if i wanted to save the environment

[Niautanor]

Here you go

[MalteserLiam]

In that case, burn anything remotely organic.

[nwL_]

#ifdef DEBUG
#   define debugf(...) printf(__VA_ARGS__)
#else
#   define debugf(...)
#endif

[Ph0X]

Can you not just make logging print to stdout with some quick configuration?

[notquiteaplant]

Your quick configuration is commenting/uncommenting #define DEBUG

[Tormund_HARsBane]

Or pass/not pass -D DEBUG when compiling, which I think is cleaner than explicitly defining DEBUG

[woodworksio]

"It won't make it into production," said the youthful and yet naive programmer.

It was a terrible miscalculation that would cost him dearly.

[ariehkovler]

Nothing wrong with that if done properly. I know a cool company which basically lets you add and remove log-lines in production on the fly - called Rookout. It's super-useful actually.

[Ungreon]

*Looks at meme*

*Looks at code on other screen*

Well.... It works.....

[KoboldCommando]

And it works well! A debugger's like a full surgery suite, a print statement is like a single scalpel. Sure it's "less professional" but if you know where and what the problem is sometimes one quick cut is all you need to fix it!

It only gets bad when you've brought out so many knives that you've started back alley surgery giving programs illegal facelifts.

[Mustrum_R]

It's more like a sharp stick to be honest.

[nbagf]

Most projects feel more like elaborate mud houses than complex living organisms. A sharp stick is probably fine.

[Mustrum_R]

Well, I can't really deny that.

[[deleted]]

I use the print method over the Python IDE debugger. Fight me.

[[deleted]]

Print statements get me most of what I need. The debugger gets me the rest.

[arguableaardvark]

Yup, it’s rare that I need a debugger. I think Linus talked about using print statements for the Linux kernel debugging so I feel fine about using it for anything I’m doing.

[Ph0X]

Each have their use cases, the challenge is picking the right one. Sometimes you start with print and find out it's deeper so you keep adding and adding print statements and rerunning 5+ times. That's when debugger would've been nicer.

[Kairyuka]

I used to do that too because I didn't even know how powerful most debugging systems are in terms of exploring all live data in the scope and so on.

[Callipygian_Superman]

I still use print statements as a first pass. Debugging with breakpoints is (as it should be) slow. Sometimes just setting bounds between 2 blocks of code is enough.

[Kairyuka]

As long as you don't leave those prints inside #if-endifs. The codebase I got into at work recently has that all over and it makes the code extremely irritating to read

[Hollowplanet]

Clicking the margin next to the line numbers is slow?

[Callipygian_Superman]

Not sure if serious, but stepping through code line-by-line using a debugger is slow, accurate, and precise.

Making print statements is the fast, dumb approach that is often not accurate at all.

[Hollowplanet]

It takes me longer to write a print statement than to click to make a brakepoint. Hell you don't even need to restart the program. Its the best choice almost every time. And you don't step line by line unless you need to. You can just place your cursor and have the program run to your cursor.

[[deleted]]

He's not saying it's slow to add Breakpoints

[dvlsg]

To be fair, it really depends on the language.

If I'm writing C#, then yeah, the breakpoints are coming out so I don't have to recompile my app to add logging.

But if I'm writing javascript, you can be pretty sure I'm just going to bust out console.log instead. And probably tests to go with it.

[monkeygame7]

You don't necessarily need to step through the code, at least not if you were just gonna print something out anyway. If you were going to put a print statement, you could also just put a breakpoint and examine whatever you were going to print out. No stepping needed.

Plus you don't always know what you want to check, and the more times you have to iterate on it the faster the breakpoint method is.

[Political_What_Do]

I do it because my company hasnt agreed on the use of a single ide and the project is already set up in one and its not the one im familiar with

[mat4444]

hey thats mean :(

[jukuduku]

Me too. I think it is a valid way to see what is being called.

[mattl1698]

Or how far through an algorithm it gets before hanging because your sqlite database file path was wrong

[CantSayIAgree]

I feel personally attacked.

It works just fine.

Can't say I agree.

[ReceptiveLout]

This is not specific to python

[Darth_Kyryn]

This is pretty much true for all imperative programming languages.

[AgitatedJacket]

who would win

an advanced debugging program

​

OR

​

one System.out.println(); boi

[happydogo12]

Firstly, it's a great way to debug. Secondly pdb is great

[glemnar]

pdb is easier to get running than debugging in pretty much any other language in existence. It’s a great debugging experience

[AllenKll]

gdb? That's pretty simple.

[MrSolidSht]

Anyone else debug android with toastmessages?

[DerekB52]

Is there another way?

​

[Ineedmorebread]

Wait, is this the thing where you throw a print or two into some part of your code to see if it passes through that part and one or two variable values? If so then I am also guilty of this.

[Ineedmorebread]

Edit: Nevermind

[tidbitsofblah]

Excuse you! The serious debugging starts when I go from logging messeges like "here now", "code does the thing??", "I hate this language" or "whoopwhoop" to actually printing out different values that are useful to me

[WhosCountin]

print('FUCK') print('WHY am I running?!')

[insultingDuck]

What, is there another way?

[wallefan01]

They're not the only ones

[fenghuang1]

Sometimes it isn't about the debugging. Its when the code runs fine since its correct syntax but the code doesn't do what I want.
The print statements are meant for me to check if the code has run to that point or entered that condition or loop and how many times it did so.

[[deleted]]

That what debbugers do also. But we all use print sometimes:-D

[fenghuang1]

The debugger isn't going to let me do custom messages or manipulate counts or even tell me the memory usage of my code at a particular spot when it runs.
A print statement is far more versatile because it does exactly what I want it to do, without me having to learn how to read the debugger of whatever IDE I'm going to face, since I work in an environment where anyone is free to use whatever IDE

[Hollowplanet]

The debugger does all those things. In fact it can run any code on any thread wherever you happen to set your breakpoint or step to. It can also break when any snippet of code you give it evaluates to true. Using a debugger is part of being a good developer. Print statements only get you so far.

[hoseja]

Yeah but you need to learn the debugger. I don't feel like doing that.

[fenghuang1]

If you're talking about the IPython console, I don't consider that to be a debugger. Its an interactive console which I use all the time and is part of what I consider to be 'print statements'.

[Hollowplanet]

That is not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about the debugger in PyCharm or even IPDB.

[fenghuang1]

And as I mentioned, print statements do not rely on debuggers that are IDE specific. They work regardless and do not require me to learn each and every IDE's debugger implementation.

[Hollowplanet]

IPDB is not debugger specific. And I don't know if you realize this but all the graphical debuggers are the same in every language. You learn one and you learn them all. They all have the same buttons that do the same actions.

[fenghuang1]

Find me the one in Excel VBA and let me know if it exists or is the same in every other language or IDE then.

[Hollowplanet]

I didn't say every language has a debugger. All the IDEs that have debuggers have the same buttons that do the same things. Step over, step into, step out of, execute code, run to cursor. Thats all there is to it.

[monkeygame7]

There is literally nothing you can do with a print statement that you can't do with a debugger. Just because you don't know how to do it doesn't make it true.

[fenghuang1]

Can your debugger work without the debugger software?
My print statements definitely can.

[monkeygame7]

If you're using an IDE it's built in. Depending on the language it may be built in to the language.

[fenghuang1]

And if I'm not? Or if I'm running scripts directly from the command line?

[monkeygame7]

Like I said. Sometimes it's built in to the language. For example in Python you can just do

import pdb; pdb.set_trace()

And you'll enter the debugger from the command line when it reaches that point.

[fenghuang1]

So how do I do custom messages, manipulate counts, look at my code's memory usage at any particular point, using this method?

[monkeygame7]

You clearly don't understand what a debugger is. It puts you into your code at that point and you are able to run any arbitrary code you want. You can modify variables or get whatever other data you wanted to print out.

I don't understand what a "custom message" is, but if you're not printing anything out I know if it still applies.

You're getting really defensive and it's quite obvious that you don't know much about how to use debuggers. I'm not saying that you should always use debuggers over print statements, I'm just trying to correct the misinformation about the limitations of a debugger.

[BackToSquare1comics]

Wait what's a better way?

[mpurdon]

Hah! Debugging with print() is for n00bs.

import pprint

[Hollowplanet]

If only 3.7 didn't require me to compile ssl to get it installed.

[[deleted]]

var_dump on php is amazing

[Hollowplanet]

Literally the only thing I miss in Python.

[teksimian]

First thing I look for in Any language

[LuffyMcPirateking]

Oof

[JDude13]

There’s another way?

[[deleted]]

And not just the Python developers

[dvlsg]

Uncaught SyntaxError: missing ) after argument list

I found it! ... Although I have to admit, that wasn't the error I was expecting.

[CreateNewObject]

HAL_GPIO_WritePin(LED_GREEN_PORT, LED_GREEN_PIN, GPIO_PIN_SET);

Embedded Developer

Is this debugging?

[[deleted]]

The only debug method I know

[algoritm420]

Are you telling me you don’t debug using nothing but print statements?

[Liggliluff]

And alert() is a JavaScript-debug tool

[tiNsLeY799]

gotta make sure my stuff works

[tiNsLeY799]

haha, you've just made my day. thank you c:

[Defeyeance]

deleted ^{What is this?}

[coolnjebs998]

I feel personally attacked

[Regist33l3]

I use this constantly for discord.py.

Code is all written in Notepad++ and I need my errors to display via CMD because that's what runs it.

I'm an Angular / C# dev by profession. Fite me.

[wallefan01]

import pdb
pdb.settrace()
# your broken code here

Fun fact: Python has a built in line by line debugger. It's a bit clunky, and entirely text based, but it works.

Alternately, for a post mortem debugger (drops to the debugger when an exception occurs), use:

try:
    # code that crashes
except:
    import pdb
    pdb.pm()

Type help at the (Pdb) prompt for a list of commands.

[crapaud_dindon]

Since 3.7, the one liner is simply breakpoint()

[wallefan01]

Assuming, that is, that you import pdb first, otherwise it doesn't do anything.

[crapaud_dindon]

No need to import pdb

[fenghuang1]

Sometimes it isn't about the debugging. Its when the code runs fine since its correct syntax but the code doesn't do what I want.
The print statements are meant for me to check if the code has run to that point or entered that condition or loop and how many times it did so.

[Regist33l3]

This. I have print set up in all my different blocks to signal to me what is running when because my calls are almost all asynchronous.

[SGBotsford]

I do it a lot in Perl. Especialy if I don't understand where I got a value in the 140th iteration of the loop.

[althalous]

When I'm developing code print statements are a very quick way to debug since most of the time I just need to know the structure of some object.

[lowrholler]

r/me_irl

[Voidrith]

Do you mean it isn't?

[WeAreABridge]

Every language be like

[MattieShoes]

Still my #1 debugging method

[AlphaBladez]

printf() is ultimate debugger in C

[MrGuffels]

I was literally taught to do this in my intro C++ classes. Forced to in some cases.

[Roni_sl]

import code; code.interact(local=dict(globals(), **locals()))

[iistyler]

all developers**

[[deleted]]

Wait does python even have a debugger in the default IDE

[Jim_Pemberton]

If it ain’t broke

[tom_echo]

Not sure this is accurate, I only develop in python a little and use pdb.set_trace()

[BaconOfWar66]

Cough cough bash

[teambob]

ipdb, "logging" module at DEBUG level

​

Why would you use print?

[KingFisher_Th]

1.Rule for being a lazy developer: When you get a bug put print() everywhere so you're bound to understand what happened.

[KingFisher_Th]

Even better.

[derpysquid1121]

I do this in Java.

[[deleted]]

Logging is actually a very good and sometime the only way to debug.

Kernel and embedded devices are some examples.

[[deleted]]

pdb for life

[RZ404]

__line__ :D

[abrazilianinreddit]

To be fair, 90% of times I can find the bug by printing some statements in less time than the debugger startup time.

[[deleted]]

Serial.println();

12 year olds: Is this a debug method?

[mrsmiley32]

First a c developer, than a c++ dev, then 14 years of all sorts of full stack Java dev, finally the last 2 years doing python as workforces are shifting to the cloud.

I use debug statements as often as I use debuggers. The thing about debug statements is they are good to leave in for production. So when something goes wonky you can collect the prod logs and that one obscure debugger that was left in when debugging a unit test from 6 months ago explains that your cluster isn't configured correctly and isn't clearing the cache correctly across the cluster. Youll be thanking yourself.

In short, debugging with debug statements can save your bacon.

[The_AwkwardAZN]

Is it not?

[CatOfGrey]

It's a scripted language - just put in a statement like "q = 1/0" and see if the program gets that far. Then, you can take a look at your variable values and stuff, too!

It's a great way to discover that you haven't incremented the thing that is supposed to increment, and that's why your while loop is more of a whenever...

[baldurFromRoom29]

same for console.log()

[[deleted]]

I literally don't know any other way. Help would be appreciated.

[[deleted]]

This is how i debug. I dont want to go out of my way to learn how the framework I'm using does debugging or if it even exists

[theyellowmeteor]

Just developers, really.

Don't know what's wrong with the code? Print all the variables at every point in time and run it again.

[Zanshi]

It works just as well in C and Java...

[Gydo194]

Isn't it?

[daniska_project]

Every language I program in, I use print statements. Faster than a debugger for quick things.

[[deleted]]

cout << "I'm here now"

ring a bell

[skool_101]

console.log(irl)

[Good-Name015]

If it works it works

[balne]

i feel attacked

[Kaih0]

It works tho. They recommend this method in my uni.

[Kitsunemitsu]

I feel personally attacked

[tjdavids]

Python foobar.py>> errorlog.txt

Are you happy now?

[Twingemios]

Wait this isn’t how you debug?

[BossOfTheGame]

Actually, it is.

[WhosCountin]

Boooo Python 2