Patent Grant
7530053
A portion of the disclosure of this patent document contains material which is subject to copyright protection. The copyright owner has no objection to the facsimile reproduction by anyone of the patent document of the patent disclosure, as it appears in the Patent and Trademark Office patent file or records, but otherwise reserves all copyright rights whatsoever.
The present invention relates to the debugging and/or editing of software code.
Remote debugging systems are becoming evermore important for the growing Web application and Web services industry. These systems allow a developer to monitor, inspect, and control the execution of software running on a remote server. This is especially critical for diagnosing problems that show up after deploying the software, but cannot be reproduced in the local development environment.
Unfortunately, most remote debugging protocols (e.g., the Java™ Debugging Interface (JDI)) are inefficient and resource intensive. These protocols are implemented by sending a constant stream of fine-grained information about debugging requests, state information, and events. This results in a slow and unproductive experience for developers and requires more effective communications bandwidth than is otherwise necessary. Bandwidth utilization problems are exacerbated by the fact that fine grain debugging messages may use only a small portion of the fixed size network packets used to transmit them, increasing communications overhead by transmitting many packets that are largely empty.
To make matters worse, debugging protocols are designed to be synchronous, meaning a debugging client must stop and wait for the results from each request it sends before the client can send another request or continue processing. This “blocking and waiting” behavior often means the end user cannot enter their next command until the remote debugging system responds. Consequently, the user interface becomes sluggish and frustrating for the developer. This is true for both local and remote debugging.
Often, the user isn't even interested in the result returned by the debugger, which immediately gets thrown away when the user enters their next command. For example, users often want to step rapidly through each line of the code to see which instructions are executed under certain conditions. With a synchronous debugging protocol, the user must wait after each step command for the debugger to return information about the new line. However, that information is discarded without being examined as soon as the user enters the next step command.
These problems are more pronounced when the debugging client is a visual Integrated Development Environment (IDE). This IDE will usually generate many requests for debugging information automatically on behalf of the user, based on assumptions about the information the developer will “likely” want to inspect. Thus, when the IDE's assumptions are correct, the IDE can answer the user's most “likely” questions quickly from results cached in memory.
Unfortunately, this eager method for collecting debugging information does not come without a cost, but results in more requests being sent to the debugger and ultimately more waiting for more results that never get used. Some IDEs attempt to reduce the amount of information they request. However, when the user requests a piece of information the IDE did not anticipate, the user must wait longer for the IDE to request that information from the debugger. At a minimum, the IDE may request debugging information about running application state that is immediately visible to the programmer in the IDE. For example,
Methods in accordance with embodiments of the present inventions can improve upon existing debugging approaches by utilizing a debugging proxy. A debugging proxy can be used to manage communication between a client and a debugger or debugging component. A debugging protocol can be used by the debugging proxy to facilitate communication management. A debugging protocol can provide for asynchronous messaging, and can allow for the communication of large grain messages. A debugging protocol can also implement a priority scheme that can be used to process messages between a client and a debugger based upon a priority assigned to each message.
Other features, aspects, and objects of the invention can be obtained from a review of the specification, the figures, and the claims.
Methods in accordance with embodiments of the present invention overcome problems with existing debugging approaches by utilizing an efficient, responsive debugging proxy. The debugging proxy manages communication between the client and the debugger. Communication with the debugger is handled using the debugger's native interfaces (e.g., JDI) allowing the debugger to be used in any context where a standard debugger exists. The proxy may be located on the same machine or even in the same process as the debugger ensuring potentially inefficient communications are completed locally without requiring network resources.
Communication with a client can be handled using a new asynchronous debugging protocol that uses large grain messages. Such a protocol can also implement a priority scheme for ensuring high priority requests get answered quickly, and allowing lower priority requests to get automatically overridden (i.e., canceled) if the associated results are no longer needed by the client.
A large grain, asynchronous debugging protocol can be used to manage communication between the client and the debugging proxy. Instead of sending a constant stream of fine-grained debugging messages, a client can send larger debugging messages, and can send them less frequently than would otherwise be necessary. This can result in lower overall communication requirements and more efficient use of available bandwidth. Consequently, the results of debugging requests can be available to the client faster, especially for remote debugging sessions.
In addition, communications between a client and a debugging proxy can be asynchronous. Therefore, the client need not block and wait for the results of each debugging result it sends. Instead, a client can send a request and return control to the user, allowing the user to continue interacting with the client and sending commands. Therefore, the client can send several commands (e.g., step) without waiting for the results from the previous command to be returned and displayed. Results can be returned to the client asynchronously, allowing the client to update its display with the new information as that information becomes available, without disrupting the responsiveness of the debugging client to the user.
In addition to implementing a coarse grained and asynchronous protocol, a debugging proxy can implement a priority scheme that allows faster processing of higher priority commands. Thus, commands most likely to require a fast response to the user can bypass commands that don't require as fast a response.
Some higher priority debugging requests can also override, or effectively cancel, lower priority requests if there is no longer any need to complete them. For example, when a user steps into a new function, a debugging client may send a “step into” request followed by several lower priority requests, to get the values of variables in the new function scope. If the user immediately steps into another function before the values of variables are returned, the requests for those variables can be cancelled. The variables requested during the first step operation may no longer be visible in the new function scope after the second step operation. Therefore it can be safe to cancel the request instead of waiting for and ultimately discarding the results.
Architecture
In one embodiment, when the worker threads are not processing immediate priority requests, they dequeue and processes requests from the priority queue starting with the highest priority items first and working through the remaining items in reverse priority order (i.e., highest to lowest priority). For each coarse grained request, the proxy object creates a new worker thread, which generates the corresponding series of fine grained requests to the server conforming to the server's standard (but less efficient) debugging protocol and waits for the corresponding results. The debug proxy may create a separate worker thread for each coarse grained request so it can continue processing additional requests without waiting for results from previous requests.
The debugging proxy may be located on the same machine as the server or even in the same process as the debugger on the server. Therefore, potentially inefficient communications governed by the server's standard debugging protocol may execute locally without requiring unnecessary communication overhead or consuming network resources.
When a worker thread has all the required responses back from the server, it will aggregate the results into a single coarse grained message and place it in the response queue. The debugging proxy removes items from the response queue in order and sends them asynchronously to the client.
The debug listener in the client listens for asynchronous results from the server and notifies the UI as it receives them. The UI may then update its display based on the new information.
Some debugging requests sent to the server may result in one or more asynchronous response messages (a.k.a. events). For example, after the server receives a “set breakpoint” request it may generate an asynchronous response every time that breakpoint is encountered while running the code. The worker threads listen for asynchronous events from the server, package them into coarse grained messages and send them to the client in much the same way synchronous messages from the server are processed.
Debugging Protocol
In one embodiment, the coarse grained, asynchronous debugging protocol consists of a series of request and response messages. In one embodiment, the messages implemented by serialized Java™ objects. Each of these objects contains the information needed to represent the associate request or response. Standard Java™ serialization rules are used to transmit the Java™ object over the wire. Using serialized Java™ objects makes it easy to add new message types to the protocol relatively quickly without having to define new wire formats for each message.
Debugging Message Base Class
In one embodiment, each Java™ object representing a particular message is derived from a common base class. Therefore, each message shares some common behavior and may inherit default behavior from the base class. One such common base class is described below.
Debugging Message Summary
The following is a list of messages included in the debugging protocol in one embodiment. In one embodiment, each message includes a name, a priority (listed under “Pri”), a yes or no value indicating whether this message overrides lower priority messages previously sent (listed under “Ov”) and optional comments.
Debugging Message Details
This section provides a detailed description of Java™ classes that could be used to define each of the messages above in one embodiment. Information available in each message is reflected by the fields and methods defined on each class (and its super classes) for accessing that information.
Sent from the proxy to the IDE in response to a SetMethodBreakpointRequestPacket
Sent from IDE to proxy to request a breakpoint be set on a method
Request to set a conditional breakpoint, sent from IDE to proxy. Response comes back as a SetBreakpointResponsePacket, NOT a SetConditionalBreakpointResponsePacket
Sent from the proxy in response to a SetBreakPointRequestPacket from the IDE. Contains information about success/failure to set the breakpoint.
Sent from IDE to proxy to tell it to set a breakpoint
This class holds a map, and makes sure it serializes to a form that makes sense
Sent from the IDE to the proxy to tell it to remove a method breakpoint
Sent from IDE to proxy to ask to remove an already set breakpoint
Sent from the IDE to the proxy to remove all currently set breakpoints
Sent from proxy to IDE to tell it the VM being debugged hit a breakpoint. Includes relevant information that will likely be displayed in the IDE.
Priority Queue
In one embodiment, a debugging proxy can use a priority queue. A priority queue can be implemented using several individual queues, such as one for each available priority. When a new request message arrives from the client, the debugging proxy can examine its priority and places the message on the corresponding queue. If the message is an override message, the debugging proxy can remove all the messages from each queue with a lower priority number than the override message.
Worker threads can process messages with immediate priority first. Then, the threads can begin checking for messages in the queues. Worker threads can check the highest priority queue first. If there is at least one message in the highest priority queue (e.g., HIGH), the worker threads can remove and process the message on the front of that queue. If the highest priority queue is empty, the worker threads can check the next highest priority queue (e.g., MEDIUM). If there is at least one message on the next highest priority queue, the worker threads can remove the message on the front of the queue and process that message. This process can continue in reverse priority order (i.e., highest priority to lowest priority) as long as the debugging proxy is running. If all queues are empty, the worker threads can continue checking starting again with the highest priority queue and working down to the lowest.
In one embodiment, message priorities are assigned statically based on message type. In another embodiment, message priorities may be assigned dynamically based on information that changes at run-time. For example, messages requesting information currently visible in the IDE or that the user has examined frequently may be given higher priority than messages requesting information that is not currently visible or has been accessed less frequently. In this embodiment, the client may be given an API for adjusting the default priorities of some messages.
Debugging Communication Infrastructure
This section contains details of an exemplary communication infrastructure that can be used to send and receive debugging messages in one embodiment. A client can use a AsyncSocketComm class to send requests to and accept responses from the proxy. The proxy may use the PriorityComm class to accept requests from and generate responses back to the client. Requests accepted by PriorityComm may implement the priority scheme described above.
If the proxy is located in the same process space as the debugger on the server, it may use the InProcComm to send requests to and receive responses from the debugger on the server without incurring the cost of network communications. If the proxy is not located on the server, it may use ServerSocketComm to communicate with the server. It may also use ServerSocketCommAsync to communicate with the server e.g. for receiving asynchronous events from the server such as “Hit breakpoint” messages.
Communications Package Summary
Communications Package Details
This section describes details of the classes, interfaces and exceptions listed above.
This is the root exception thrown for transport errors
Simple data holder for a stack frame in the VM that's being debugged
SocketComm is Transport class that will transport over TCP
ServerSocketCommAsync is a class that will use a SocketComm for sending and receiving requests, but has another thread that is doing the actual sends/receives and queuing them to a buffer. This other thread will hang out and wait on a ServerSocket, until it can party on that socket.
ServerSocketCommAsync is a class that will use a SocketComm for sending and reciving requests, but has another thread that is doing the actual sends/recieves and queuing them to a buffer. This other thread will hang out and wait on a ServerSocket, until it can party on that socekt.
The ServerEvents interface is the interface that defines the debugging events that come from the KNEX Server to the Proxy. This will also define the events that come from the different languages to the Proxy. These same interfaces will be used to talk from the Proxy to the different languages.
The ServerController is the major piece of code that goes between the proxy and the KNEX server. This code will be shared by the
The ServerCommands interface is the interface that defines the debugging commands going from the KNEX Server to the proxy. These same interfaces will be used to talk from the Proxy to the different languages.
This holds the proper stack information for a stack that is translated from script
This class wraps other CommTransports, then when a message comes in off another transport, this will check it's priority, and if the priority is the highest, it will execute it immediately. Otherwise, it will pass it along like normal. NOTE: Although this extends AsyncSocketComm, it does not have to communicate via Sockets
Simple data holder for a stack frame in the VM that's being debugged
The script controller will be an object that interoperates with the scripting languages to bring you script debugging. The way this will work is each language engine will have an instance of the IScriptController, and the IScriptController will have list of all the IDebuggableLanguage interfaces.
This interface is used to get a context object for a given frame. The way this will work is that the Proxy will go down the stack frame, looking for objects that derive from IScriptContextHolder. When it comes across such a class, it will get the context from the frame and pass it to the DebugScriptController. It is possible for many script frames to all have the same context. In this case, the frame will only get passed to the DebugScriptController once.
A scripting engine must implement this interface in order to be able to set itself up to debug in the KNEX framework.
This is an exception that can be used to kill threads in Weblogic
This class keeps track of the info we need to be able to attach to JDI on another process.
The DebugEvents interface is the interface that defines the debugging events that come from the proxy to the IDE. This will also define the events that come from the different languages to the Proxy. These same interfaces will be used to talk from the Proxy to the different languages
A DebugController is a major piece of code that can go between the client and the server. Both sides can go through the DebugController to send debugging messages. The DebugController will then pass the appropriate commands to the appropriate DebugController via the CommTransport that is provided.
The DebugConstants interface is an interface that DebugCommands and DebugEvents derive from. This interface only defines constants that are used for defining the commands.
The DebugCommands interface is the interface that defines the debugging commands going from the UI portion of the debugger, to the debug proxy. The second half of this is the DebugEvents interface, which defines all the events that are sent from the debugger, to the IDE. These same interfaces will be used to talk from the Proxy to the different languages.
This interface defines the communication methods used.
AsyncSocketComm is a class that will use a SocketComm for sending and recievine requests, but has another thread that is doing the actual sends/receives and queuing them to a buffer.
This class wraps a CommTransport, and adds a level of indirection to make the network communications non-dependant on the message processing.
The foregoing description of preferred embodiments of the present invention has been provided for the purposes of illustration and description. It is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the invention to the precise forms disclosed. Many modifications and variations will be apparent to one of ordinary skill in the art. The embodiments were chosen and described in order to best explain the principles of the invention and its practical application, thereby enabling others skilled in the art to understand the invention for various embodiments and with various modifications that are suited to the particular use contemplated. It is intended that the scope of the invention be defined by the following claims and their equivalence.
The present application claims the benefit of priority under 35 U.S.C. §119(e) to U.S. Provisional Patent Application entitled “SYSTEMS AND METHODS UTILIZING A DEBUGGING PROXY”, Application No. 60/450,383, filed on Feb. 27, 2003, which application is incorporated herein by reference.
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