The perl debugger is a beautiful thing to behold...from afar.
Up close it is quite functional and useful, but looks enough like gdb to scare most people away. Which is too bad, because its syntax is rather well adapted to dealing with the realities of programming in Perl.
Notwithstanding a recent O'Reilly pocketbook guide, the debugging documentation is a bit sketchy -- limited to the Camel and Nutcase book's syntax chapters.
The debugger is also a handy tool for testing Perl syntax and profiling your code. Being written in Perl, you can use it from within your programs (this is where the $DB::single = 1 lines in modules come from). Setting programatic breakpoints or switching tracing within your code lets Perl do the work. Letting your code debug itself is the height of lazyness -- and good coding.
Also, the "ptkdb" module now offers a GUI experience for those who don't enjoy wallowing in mud... er, the command line.
The talk will give a short introduction to dealing with the debugger, debugging with $DB::single, installing and using ptkdb and the Profiler.
Steve Lembark is a Systems Architect and Perl hacker. On occasion he has been known to type something correctly, at which point the debugger is still useful.
College of DuPage
Building OCC, Rm 128b
22nd and Lambert
Glen Ellyn, IL 60137-6599
Take 355 to Butterfield Rd (Rt 56). All UniForum Chicago PerlSIG meetings are open to the public free of charge.
Contact Deborah Vose at (630) 829-7033 or vosede@lidp.com for additional information about the meeting.
For more information about UniForum Chicago contact nemec@xnet.com.