Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work.

perl514 has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by choroba (Cardinal) on Dec 10, 2011 at 12:42 UTC
Is `perl -d` too old school for you?	[reply] [d/l]
Re^2: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by perl514 (Pilgrim) on Dec 10, 2011 at 13:43 UTC
Hi, I didnt know perl -d option was there. Can you point me to a guide where it says how to go about using it?	[reply]
Re^3: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by choroba (Cardinal) on Dec 10, 2011 at 13:46 UTC
See perldebug.	[reply]
Re^4: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by perl514 (Pilgrim) on Dec 10, 2011 at 18:11 UTC
Re: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by moritz (Cardinal) on Dec 10, 2011 at 13:10 UTC
When I look for Perl software, I usually try the CPAN first, and that's what I'd recommend for you too: debug or debugger. Perl 6 - second systems done right	[reply]
Re: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by keszler (Priest) on Dec 10, 2011 at 13:03 UTC
I've used Devel::ptkdb. It hasn't been updated since 26 Apr 2004, but tried just now it runs with Perl 5.12 on XP. Activestate may not have a ppm for it, but since it's just a single .pm file all that's needed is to put it in your C:\Perl\site\lib\Devel directory. ...assuming that Tk is already installed...	[reply]
Re^2: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by perl514 (Pilgrim) on Dec 10, 2011 at 18:13 UTC
Hi, I dont have TK installed, and couldnt find it in PPM. Using -d option as of now, but thank you for taking time to reply.	[reply]
Re^3: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by keszler (Priest) on Dec 10, 2011 at 18:42 UTC
It appears that the Bribes repository has Tk compiled for 64-bit Perl 5.14. Try `ppm install http://www.bribes.org/perl/ppm/Tk.ppd` [download]	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by cormanaz (Deacon) on Dec 10, 2011 at 16:52 UTC
Well it's not free, but it's free to try: Activestate Komodo IDE. It's got a GUI based debugger that shows you current values of local and special variables in a tabbed format. More convenient than the built in Perl debugger, IMO.	[reply]
Re^2: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by cavac (Prior) on Dec 10, 2011 at 17:16 UTC
I can agree on that. Tried various other things in the past few years. Always went back to the ActiveState products. Without trying to pitch a product here: At least from my point of view, the full ActivePerl Pro Studio is well worth the price. Having a fully grown IDE and Access to the Safari bookshelf saved me quite a lot of frustration. It's certainly not perfect, but it gets the job done. What i certainly like most is the standard way in which debugging is handled. It's just like i'm used to from other IDEs, just click left of the code line where you want a breakpoint, run and the program stops there - and then you can look at (and modify) all variables. If it's worth the price for you certainly depends. Do you only do Perl programming for a hobby a few hours a week or is it your job? For me, i'm doing like 30 hours a week programming in my 40 hour a week job. Plus whatever i do in my spare time. So yeah, paying for a product that helps me isn't really a problem. Don't use '#ff0000': use Acme::AutoColor; my $redcolor = RED(); All colors subject to change without notice.	[reply]
Re^3: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by perl514 (Pilgrim) on Dec 10, 2011 at 18:16 UTC
Hi, I am not a developer by profession. Just trying to learn Perl. Since I am not writing really big and complex stuff like how you guys write, getting a full version of Komodo would be kind of an overkill for me. But yeah, I am using Komodo IDE and finding it much better. Was using Notepad earlier... Thanks	[reply]
Re^4: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by Marshall (Canon) on Dec 10, 2011 at 23:56 UTC
Re: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by umasuresh (Hermit) on Dec 10, 2011 at 12:53 UTC
Check this node: Re: Parse variables	[reply]
Re^2: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by perl514 (Pilgrim) on Dec 10, 2011 at 13:31 UTC
Hi, It fails. C:\perl\practice>ppm install Tk ppm install failed: Can't find any package that provides Tk C:\perl\practice>	[reply]
Re^3: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by keszler (Priest) on Dec 10, 2011 at 13:38 UTC
Activestate Tk packages Activestate haven't (yet?) created a working Tk package for Perl 5.14 on Windows. They do have packages for 5.12, or 5.14 on Linux...	[reply]
Re: Looking for a free Perl debugger. Padre/Epic doesnt seem to work. by TJPride (Pilgrim) on Dec 10, 2011 at 14:06 UTC
If I'm not sure how something works, I just write and run a tiny program to test that particular situation. With proper sectioning into subs, and liberal use of print and Data::Dumper, it's not too hard to verify if something is working as planned. For the most part, anyway - logic errors can be difficult to find, as well as the occasional little thing like using == instead of eq or = instead of ==. Depending on your input, a debugger may not identify that sort of problem.	[reply]