That is a problem that I prefer solving with reduced data sets in a testing environment so that I can do development iterations faster. Plus with error messages that give enough context that I don't need to do a few test runs to figure out the bad state. And yes, I know it isn't always easy to do that. I have written my share of programs which like to run for several hours straight. I still prefer to work on them without a debugger.

In any case the question isn't whether or not debuggers make any specific bug faster to solve. Of course they do. That is their job. Once things go wrong it is usually much faster for a competent person to get an answer with a debugger than it is without. But using the debugger you will never see your program and understand it in the same way that you do without, and that makes the forest easy to miss for the trees when it comes to design mistakes.

In reply to Re (tilly) 3: Perl debugging - a look at 'beta' mechanism by tilly
in thread Perl debugging - a look at 'beta' mechanism by vladb

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