Professional Ajax, 2nd Edition

Chapter 11. Ajax Debugging Tools

One of the most important parts of the software development cycle is testing. In most companies, the developers who write the software are at least partially responsible for testing their code. The responsibilities vary from writing case studies for quality assurance personnel to creating and running unit tests themselves. In any case, software bugs will occur, and that is when debugging software becomes an invaluable tool.

Debuggers have come a long way since their humble beginnings. What used to be an arduous journey at a text-based console has given way to today's graphic debuggers, complete with color-coded information to make rapid application development more, well, rapid.

For Ajax applications, debugging has historically been difficult. The mixture of JavaScript and client-server communication proved to be a unique challenge for programmers trying to bullet-proof their code. More recently, however, new techniques and technologies have arisen that make debugging Ajax applications much easier.