Specifying a Filename in a Breakpoint in the Perl Debugger

clwolfe has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hello all,

I've been using the Perl debugger (perl -d) more and more lately, especially running it on test files to exercise modules. I often want to set a breakpoint in a file other than the current one, but I can't seem to figure that out. Any suggestions?

To clarify, suppose I have a test script try_it.pl, that calls methods in a OOP module Fragile, which in turn calls methods in Broken::Completely. When I run perl -d try_it.pl, I can step line by line, and set breakpoints by specifying a line within the current file (using b 123 for line 123), but I have to wait until I step into Fragile, and then step into Broken/Completely before setting a breakpoint in that file. I thus end up usually running the file at least twice - one pass just to set breakpoints, then restart using 'R', then run to next breakpoint using 'c'. Is there a better way?

Thanks,
Clinton

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Re: Specifying a Filename in a Breakpoint in the Perl Debugger by zwon (Abbot) on Jan 22, 2009 at 19:43 UTC
You can set breakpoint in other module using the same `b` command: `b Broken::Completely::method`	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: Specifying a Filename in a Breakpoint in the Perl Debugger by clwolfe (Scribe) on Jan 22, 2009 at 21:24 UTC
Ahh, I see. I had used that before, but I had read the docs as `b subname`, not thinking that I could use the full package name of a sub. My only complaint is that will set a breakpoint on entry to the sub. If the sub is many lines long, I want to give a line number, like `b some/file/name 1165`... (Or, I could be a good little agile programmer and write shorter subs....) Thanks for the response!	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Specifying a Filename in a Breakpoint in the Perl Debugger by clwolfe (Scribe) on Jan 27, 2009 at 03:55 UTC
And now to answer my own question... Turns out the 'f' command will help. The 'h' docs says that it let you view the code in another file, but in fact it switches your whole context to the other files (not the execution point, of course). You can then easily say 'b 1024' or whatever to set a breakpoint at a particular line, then switch back using 'f' again. So, in my example above, I might run the debugger on try_it.pl, then immediately type `f lib/Broken/Completely`, then `b 1234` to set a breakpoint at line 1234, then switch back to try_it.pl with `f try_it.pl`.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^2: Specifying a Filename in a Breakpoint in the Perl Debugger by perlyogi (Acolyte) on Sep 04, 2011 at 06:49 UTC
Thanks clwolfe, that was a very useful piece of information	[reply]
Re^2: Specifying a Filename in a Breakpoint in the Perl Debugger by Anonymous Monk on May 24, 2013 at 10:16 UTC
Thanks clwolfe. It works perfectly.	[reply]
Re: Specifying a Filename in a Breakpoint in the Perl Debugger by targetsmart (Curate) on Jan 23, 2009 at 06:25 UTC
You can try devel::sdb it has flexible breakpoints and zoom points which might help you.	[reply]

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