Debugging ASP.NET and AJAX Applications

This page is specific to

Microsoft Visual Studio 2008/.Net Framework 3.5

Other versions are also available for the following:

Visual Studio Debugger

Debugging ASP.NET Web applications is similar to debugging a Windows Form or any other Windows application because both kinds of applications involve controls and events. However, there are also basic differences between the two kinds of applications:

Keeping track of state is more complex in a Web application.
In a Windows application, the code to be debugged is mostly in one location; in a Web application, the code can be on the client and on the server. While ASP.NET code is all on the server, there might also be JavaScript or Visual Basic code on the client.

In This Section

Preparing to Debug ASP.NET: Describes the steps that are required to enable debugging of ASP.NET applications.
Debugging Web Applications and Services: Discusses how to debug a ASP.NET application, including AJAX-enabled script applications, and XML Web services.

Related Sections

Exception Handling (Debugging): Explains why Just My Code must be enabled for debugging ASP.NET exceptions.

Concepts

Debugger Security

Other Resources

Debugging Web Applications and Script

Debug Settings and Preparation

Debugger Roadmap

Tags

: Add a tag

Community Content

Add new content

Annotations

Tip: unit test as you go to reduce bugs

CSharpUniversity.com | Edit | Show History

You can use the Visual Studio Debugger to unit test your methods as you are coding. When you complete a block or section of code, place a break point at the beginning of the block, then run the ASP.NET web application in debug mode and try to generate events that exhaust the various code paths/conditions. This way you can quickly validate that your code is behaving as expected and reduce bugs in the long run. This is a more proactive way of using the debugger but works quite well and is super easy to do.

For practice and more information about the debugger go to: http://www.csharpuniversity.com/2008/11/23/using-the-visual-web-developer-debugger/