Debugging your Flash applications can take some getting used to.  Especially, if you’ve never used a debugger before. Having the right tool to aid in debugging your Flash Applications can save a boat load of time.  Also when debugging, the debugging tool used should provide easy access to your ActionScript data with little of a learning curve. An innovative debugging tool that I have been pretty fond of lately has been De MonsterDebugger.

What is De MonsterDebugger?

These days my ActionScript 3.0 debugger of choice has been De MonsterDebugger.  De MonsterDebugger is an easy to use open source debugger for Adobe Flash,Flex, and AIR created by the guys over at De Monsters.  Not only does it provide an Adobe-styled familiar interface, but it comes in a convenient Adobe AIR Application.  It’s impressive list of features make it a tough debugger to compete with.

DeMonster Debugger comes with an impressive set of features:

• Can be used with Adobe AIR applications
• Can be used with Adobe Flex applications
• Can be used with full screen Adobe Flash applications
• Trace strings, numbers, objects, arrays, XML and even custom classes
• Trace the complete structure of multilevel objects
• Trace messages in custom colors
• Explore your live application
• Edit properties at runtime
• Run methods and get the results at runtime
• Application is lightweight
• Auto update
• Look and feel of Adobe CS4
• Customizable interface
• Highlight display objects
• Client class included
• Example application included
• FDT templates included

The one feature that is probably missing from it’s feature set is probably the ability to step through break points, but hey, I won’t be picky. It is still a great debugging tool and best of all it is open source!

Check out the video rundown on De MonsterDebugger!

Be sure you check out this video created by Lee Brimelow as he demonstrates some of the coolest features this slick debugging tool has to offer.

Additional Resources:

• Download the AIR application
• Learn more about De MonsterDebugger
• Spread the word

What is Pv3DDebug?

Do you frequently use Papervision3D?  Well, if you said yes, then I am sure you are aware of the daunting task of debugging your Papervision3D applications.  Now those tasks can easily tackled using a pretty neat tool created by Jason Bejot called PV3DDebug.  PV3DDebug is a debug console to be used with your Papervision3D applications.

PV3DDebug comes equip with many tools like:

• Displaying all render stats (i.e. Triangles, Render Time, Particles, Filtered Objects, etc.)
• Displaying system stats (i.e. FPS, Average FPS, Current Memory Use, Max Memory Use, Run Time, etc.)
• Displaying camera properties
• Allowing you to switch between multiple cameras
• Allowing you to adjust camera properties
• Ability to turn on/off individual stat windows

Additional Resources:

Lee Brimelow mentioned of an AIR application that enables enhanced logging for AIR and Flash applications. The application is named Arthropod and allows you to color-code your log messages for easy viewing. A nice alternative to the existing Flash IDE debugger. Happy debugging!

Via The Flash Blog