Adding tests to and refactoring the perl debugger - Grant Conclusion Report

Grant Conclusion Report

Shlomi Fish has sent a Grant Conclusion Report:

This is a final report of my grant of improving the Perl built-in debugger (invoked using perl -d on the command line with code residing in lib/perl5db.pl and tests in lib/perl5db.t), by adding more tests and refactoring it.

The grant was completed mostly successfully, after the number of test assertions in lib/perl5db.t was increased to 108, and the debugger's core code (in lib/perl5db.pl) has been made more modular and elegant. The reason it was not a full success is because the debugger's code is still not as elegant as it could be, but part of the problem was my desire not to break bug-to-bug backwards compatibility of CPAN and darkpan modules that make use of the debugger's internal API.

During the grant, my grant manager, Alan Haggai Alavi, published several reports on the TPF blog on my behalf:

• http://news.perlfoundation.org/2012/09/adding-tests-to-and-refactorin.html

• http://news.perlfoundation.org/2012/09/adding-tests-to-and-refactorin-1.html

• http://news.perlfoundation.org/2012/09/adding-tests-to-and-refactorin-2.html

• http://news.perlfoundation.org/2012/10/adding-tests-to-and-refactorin-3.html

• http://news.perlfoundation.org/2012/11/adding-tests-to-and-refactorin-4.html

During the grant I have learnt what git rebase was all about, how to use it, and why it was sometimes a good idea, and also became familiar with more features of the debugger.

If anyone is interested in a more modular debugger for Perl, while doing away with backwards compatibility, they can look at Devel::Trepan:

• http://metacpan.org/module/Devel::Trepan

• http://github.com/rocky/Perl-Devel-Trepan

Otherwise, the refactored debugger should be more amenable to changes, and the additional test assertions will better ascertain it is not going to be broken as easily.

I would like to thank Alan Haggai Alavi (my grant manager), Father Chrysostomos ( https://metacpan.org/author/SPROUT - for applying some of my changesets and for fixing a bug or two I discovered), Ricardo Signes (the perl 5 pumpking), Rocky Bernstein (for writing Devel-Trepan and commenting on the grant reports), and the other perl5-porters.

I am planning on continuing working on the perl debugger, and other parts of the perl 5 core after the end of the grant, but I thank the Perl Foundation for giving me the grant, which has motivated me.

Regards, and Happy Holidays,

-- Shlomi Fish