Re: Debug code

[rlk@rational.com (Bob Kitzberger)]

Kelly J. Grant (grantk@manta.nosc.mil) wrote:

: I'm also a big fan of providing methods like  Show( title, value ),
: with overloads for various types to use for displaying values, such as
: integer, string and boolean.  Leave all this code in during
: development, and when you deliver, you could replace the package debug
: body with no-op functions (with a pragma INLINE), and you then won't
: pay a performance penalty.  It is also handy to add a defaulted parameter
: at the end with a boolean to indicate whether or not to add a new_line
: for times when you want multiple values on the same line.

Along a similar vein... I find it useful to define a Image function
for ADTs:

  package Pencil is
    type Object is private;
    function Image( The_Object : Object ) return String;
  ...

Force of habit, it usually only takes a minute to write an Image
function for a new ADT, and it comes in surprisingly handy
for inclusion in a debug setup like you describe above.  I find
defining a function that returns a string is more flexible than
defining a subprogram that writes to stdout, e.g.

--
Bob Kitzberger	      Rational Software Corporation       rlk@rational.com