vb data breakpoint?

  • Thread starter Thread starter JohnR
  • Start date Start date
J

JohnR

I understand the VS2005 still doesn't support data breakpoints in VB. My
question is this.. does anybody know of a 3rd party product that DOES
support data breakpoints in VB?

As an aside, does anyone know why it seems to be so hard to impliment data
breakpoints in VB? It is such a valuable tool.

Thanks
 
Are you talking about setting a breakpoint and then setting its properties
to conditional so that it only breaks when a particular value changes?
 
Are you talking about setting a breakpoint and then setting its properties
to conditional so that it only breaks when a particular value changes?
Click to expand...

Data breakpoints are designed to break at any point in project. The
conditional breakpoints only will break on a certain line if the value
has changed, and not on any line the value changed. Essentially, a
data breakpoint is like a conditional breakpoint on every line in the
project.

As far as support goes, the only time that data breakpoints are
available are when writing native code, presumably in C++. I believe I
read somewhere this is because the managed Garbage Collector would
make true data breakpoints impossible (or at least super-hard) to
implement. Although I haven't looked at the Orcas betas yet, it's
possible they have added them in, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Thanks,

Seth Rowe
 
Data breakpoints are designed to break at any point in project. The
conditional breakpoints only will break on a certain line if the value
has changed, and not on any line the value changed. Essentially, a
data breakpoint is like a conditional breakpoint on every line in the
project.

As far as support goes, the only time that data breakpoints are
available are when writing native code, presumably in C++. I believe I
read somewhere this is because the managed Garbage Collector would
make true data breakpoints impossible (or at least super-hard) to
implement. Although I haven't looked at the Orcas betas yet, it's
possible they have added them in, but I wouldn't bet on it.

Thanks,

Seth Rowe
Click to expand...

While not ideal... A work around for this is to NEVER access your
variables directly. Always wrap them in a property - even if it's
private. Then you can set a breakpoint in the setter of the property,
and bling you break everytime something sets the property. Yes, it
means that you have to be a little disiplined in your codeing - but it
does give you a sort of solution :)
 
Hi Tom,

Now that's an innovative solution! I never thought of it... You
actually don't even have to be disciplined, you can temporarily create a
property on the fly when you need to track down a data breakpoint. Thanks
for a great tip.
 
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