thedebugger

thedebugger is an improved debugging experience for Node.js, enabled by Chrome DevTools

Installation

Compatibility: thedebugger requires Node >=8.0.0. It works best with Node >=10.

# global install with npm:
npm install -g thedebugger


# alternatively, with yarn:
yarn global add thedebugger

Global installation may fail with different permission errors, you can find help in this thread.

Windows users: Installation may fail on Windows during compilation the native dependencies. The following command may help: npm install -g windows-build-tools

Local install

If you want thedebugger available from an npm script (eg. npm run debug runs thedebugger index.js), you can install it as a development dependency:

# local install with npm:
npm install --save-dev thedebugger


# alternatively, with yarn:
yarn add thedebugger --dev

You can then set up an npm script. In this case, thedebugger will not be available in your system path.

Getting Started

You can start debugging your Node.js application using one of the following ways:

• Use thedebugger instead of the node command

thedebugger server.js

# Alternatively, you can prepend `thedebugger`
thedebugger node server.js

• Prepend thedebugger in front of any other binary

# If you use some other binary, just prepend `thedebugger`
## npm run unit
thedebugger npm run unit

# Debug any globally installed package
## mocha
thedebugger mocha

# To use a local binary, use `npx` and prepend before it
thedebugger npx mocha

• Launch thedebugger as a standalone application
  • Then, debug any npm script from your package.json, e.g. unit tests

# cd to your project folder (with a package.json)
thedebugger .
# In Sources panel > "NPM Scripts" sidebar, click the selected "Run" button 

• Run any node command from within thedebugger's integrated terminal and thedebugger will connect automatically
• Run any open script source by using 'Run this script' context menu item, thedebugger will connect automatically as well

What can I do?

thedebugger has some powerful features exclusively for Node.js:

1. Child processes are detected and attached to.
2. You can place breakpoints before the modules are required.
3. You can edit your files within the UI. On Ctrl-S/Cmd-S, DevTools will save the changes to disk.
4. By default, thedebugger blackboxes all scripts outside current working directory to improve focus. This includes node internal libraries (like _stream_wrap.js, async_hooks.js, fs.js) This behaviour may be changed by "Blackbox anything outside working dir" setting.

In addition, you can use all the DevTools functionality that you've used in typical Node debugging:

• breakpoint debugging, async stacks (AKA long stack traces), async stepping, etc...
• console (top-level await, object inspection, advanced filtering)
• eager evaluation in console (requires Node >= 10)
• JS sampling profiler
• memory profiler

Screenshot

Contributing

Check out contributing guide to get an overview of thedebugger development.