Subj : Re: Not debugging?
To   : comp.programming,comp.lang.java.programmer,comp.lang.lisp
From : Phlip
Date : Thu Aug 25 2005 10:32 am

Greg Menke wrote:

> Sure... that'll help debug drivers on bizzaro hardware with
> incomplete/inaccurate datasheets & interrupt/context switch routines
> suffering from various race conditions.  Sometimes you just have to bite
> the bullet and debug right on the metal because of heisenbugs if nothing
> else.
>
> Care to guarantee that the emulator duplicates the bugs & timing
> characteristics of the real thing?

My admonition answers the common complaint, "I don't have time to write 
tests; I'm too busy debugging".

You have time to write tests. Writing an emulator gives you a framework to 
hang all your discoveries about the real things' bugs, and this in turn 
frees up your schedule by automating as much low-value labor as possible.

And you find those bugs --> by debugging <--.

You describe a legacy situation - someone else invented this bizarro 
hardware, and legacy situations require debugging to learn their 
characteristics.

As you learn them, add tests about them to your emulator, to _approach_ a 
state where a code failure causes a red flag in the tests _before_ it causes 
an error situation near the hardware.

The point is not to never debug. The point is to always seek ways to replace 
any necessary debugging with test cases, so the remaining debugging is 
manual labor of the highest value.

-- 
  Phlip
  http://www.greencheese.org/ZeekLand  <-- NOT a blog!!!
> Gregm

.