mrdebugger

mrdebugger is a new way for a browser user to capture the information a developer needs to reproduce and debug problems in mainresponder and Manila. The user is simply told to add the mrdebugger prefix to the path part of the url for the page with the error symptoms. So for example, instead of

http://www.baylys.com:8080/help/

use

http://www.baylys.com:8080/mrdebugger/help/

A macro called mrdebugger.macro, creates a link to the current page with the mrdebugger prefix, unless the page url starts with the prefix, in which case it links to the page without the prefix.

Installation

To install, run mrdebugger.install from a quickscript window. The responder is installed and a new macro mrdebugger.macro is made legal for mainresponder and Manila.

Theory of Operation

mrdebugger installs a responder which is invoked if the first level of the path of any url begins with the text 'mrdebugger/'. If it does, the parameters are written to the Guest Database log in the mrdebugger category and the input is passed to mainresponder in the normal way. Then mrdebugger responder rewrites all urls in the returned page so that they too have an mrdebugger prefix. This ensures that even POST operations from forms can be debugged with this tool.

A script called mrdebugger.debug illustrates how a developer can make use of the information.

mrdebugger.macro

The macro returns a link to the current page toggling the mrdebugger/ prefix on or off. The body of the link is passed as a parameter and could be a Manila picture or simply a text link. For example,

{mrdebugger.macro(pictureRef("mrdebugger icon"))}

Might produce.

Credits

Thanks to John VanDyk for the discussion that prompted me to write this little tool.