Debuggify.js

A modern multi-transport javascript debugging library for browsers focuses on enhancing development experience.

NOTE: Work In Progress.

Motivation

In Browsers, the debugging is done using native(Chrome Development Tools) or external development tools (Firebug for firefox etc. There are no common api's which work across every browser. Also development is extended to mobile devices on which debugging is even tougher. Along with the advancement of technology the use of remote debugging is growing. With increase in amount of javascript, rivers of logs flood the console, so its hard to find any message. The browser consoles also don't support module specific log management which are common in other development environments

Debuggify.js is designed to be a simple and universal debugging library to work cross browsers. Currently its focuses on Logging aspect of debugging. This library decouple logging process in to two parts (logger & collector) to make it more flexible and extensible.

Goals

• Make debugging easy for medium to large size projects
• Flexible & Extensible
• Deliver high performance
• Cross Browser support

Features

• Multiple environments support ex. development, production etc
• Multiple debugging message supported ex. info, warnings, errors etc
• Multiple project can use it on the same page
• Multiple Modules can be managed very easily within a project
• Manage debugging message for any module on the fly
• Use URL parameters to manage settings
• Optimizations for Production environment

Build Status

Master

Development

Testing

Getting Started

Installation

Run the following command to get started:

$ git clone git@github.com:debuggify/debuggify_js.git
$ git submodule update --init

You need to have npm(node package manager), you can install npm by following:

$ curl http://npmjs.org/install.sh | sh

Install requirejs to using npm

$ [sudo] npm install -g requirejs

Install Ruby Gems

$ bundle install

Build

Run the following to build the debuggify scripts.

$ rake build

After running the above successfully, check public/js path for the build files.

Test

$ rake test

Deployment

Set the Environment variable in the ~/.bashrc

export DEBUGGIFY_CDN=<AWS S3 Bucket>
export DEBUGGIFY_AWS_ACCESS_KEY_ID=<AWS KEY>
export DEBUGGIFY_AWS_SECRET_ACCESS_KEY=<AWS SECTRET>

Run the deployment

$ rake deploy

Components

• Logger
• Collector
• Transports

Logger

This logger exposes simple apis to create, get logger object which can manage projects of various sizes. All the logs are collected in to a global project.

Usage Include the script in the project

<script type="text/javascript" src="<DIR PATH>/debuggify.allinone.js"></script>

Or use the cdn hosted script

<script type="text/javascript" src="http://cdn.debuggify.net/latest/debuggify.allinone.js"></script>

Create a logger object

var project1 = debuggify.Logger.create('project1');

You can also use the library with console

var console =  debuggify.Logger('project1', options);

NOTE: The above line will replace the global console(windows.console) if local console variable is not found, so be careful while using it.

Set Development Environment (optional)

project1.setEnv('development');

If no environment is set, then the defaults are used.

NOTE User should make sure that src/eviroments/<enviroment Name>.jsfile has been include.

Start using logger

project1.log('some crappy information');
project1.error('Shit! something breaks');
project1.warn('You better watch yourself');

Add module specific logger to the project

var project1_module1 = project1.addModule('module1');

project1_module1.log('some crappy information');
project1_module1.error('Shit! something breaks');
project1_module1.warn('You better watch yourself');

Get logger object on demand

var project1 = debuggify.Logger.get('project1'); // Returns the logger object for project1
project1.log('this is a log for project1');

var project1_module1 = project1.get('module1'); // Returns the logger object for module1
project1_module1.log('this is a log for module1');

// OR
var project1_module1 = debuggify.Logger.get('project1').get('module1'); // Directly get the module logger object
project1_module1.log('this is a log for module1');

Modules Hierarchy

var project1_module1_submodule1 = debuggify.Logger.get('project1').get('module1'),get('submodule1');
project1_module1_submodule1.log('this is a log for submodule1');

Set Logging Level (optional). Every environment has it logging level already set

project1.setLevel(2); // Set warning and errors only for project on project project1
project1_module1.setLevel(0); // Show all types messages for all the children on module module1

NOTE Calling .setLevel on a logger will remove reinstall debugging methods for the new levels. This will also affect the behavior of all the children. For any module its nearest overridden parent level is used

Set Flag for any message type (optional)

project1.setFlag('error', true); // Set the flag for

NOTE Calling .setFlag on a logger will only affect the state of current object. Its children module will not be affected

Add a transport to a project

project1.addTransport('Console', {});

Control the parameter through URL by enabline debug mode.Just add query string project1__debug=true. This is very powerful can be used it to change configuration for particular module.Ex.

1.Change the environment.Following will change the environment to testing for project1 project.

urlString?project1__debug=true&env=testing

2.To disable errors/logs/warnings for a particular module.Following will not throw warnings for module1 module for project1 project.

urlString?project1__debug=true&project1__module1__info=false&project1__module1__error=false

NOTE The above is same as setFlag

3.To show or hide properties.Following will not show timestamp property for module1 module for project1 project.

urlString?project1__debug=true&project1__module1__timestamp=false

Get the logger object by its name.Following will return the logger object for project1 if it is exists else it will create a new logger object with project1 name.If you do not want to create a new logger object pass the 2nd parameter as false

debuggify.Logger.get(project1,true)

Send message for specific type(logs,error,warning).Following will change the error message for module module1 to "This is an error message".

project1.message("This is an error message", module1, error)

Collector

This component is responsible for collecting the logging messages from the global object and send it to various transports medium. The collector is independent of logger so it can be loaded on demand.

Transports

Console

Send the logs to the browser console if it exist

project1.add('Console', options)

Bookmarklets##

• Create a new bookmark on the browser toolbar

• Copy the code below and paste the it in the URL field

  javascript:void((function(){var%20e=document.createElement('script');e.setAttribute('type','text/javascript');e.setAttribute('charset','UTF-8');e.setAttribute('src','http://cdn.debuggify.net/latest/debuggify.logger.console.global.js?r='+Math.random()*99999999);document.body.appendChild(e)})()) "Drag me to the toolbar"
  

• For other scripts change the name of the script in the src

  • debuggify.logger.console.js Logger component bundled with Console Transport
  • debuggify.logger.console.global.js Overload window.console with debuggify Logger object and transport console
  • debuggify.allinone.js All the stable components are bundle together

Contributing

• Fork debuggify_js
• Create a topic branch - git checkout -b my_branch
• Rebase your branch so that all your changes are reflected in one commit
• Push to your branch - git push origin my_branch
• Create a Pull Request from your branch, include as much documentation as you can in the commit message/pull request, following these guidelines on writing a good commit message
• That's it!

Bugs & Suggestions

Make a new ticket for new bugs / suggestions at github issue tracker

Roadmap

1. Added Test Cases
2. Cross Browser Testing
3. Add examples
4. Add Transports
5. Websockets
6. Http

NOTE: currently the debuggify.js file comes with console transport. In future we will be supporting many different transports like websockets, http

Contacts

Email: contact@debuggify.net

Mailing List: debuggify@googlegroups.com

Twitter: @d3buggify

IRC:

Server: irc.freenode.net
Port: 6667
Rooms: #debuggify

Inspirations

• winston
• socket.io
• stacktrace
• requirejs

Author: @Agarwal_Ankur

Contributors: @geniussandy

Free Software, Fuck Yeah!