Why can't I get the Google Cloud Debugger to work?

Question

I've connected my Java based app engine app to Cloud Debugger via GitHub. I can see the source code and navigate the source files. But, when I place a breakpoint on a line in a source file, the debugger never captures local variables when I execute my app. How can I troubleshoot/fix this?

Answer 1

There might be few reasons why the snapshot will not hit.

1. Make sure that you are using the source code version that is deployed with your app. Many times the head revision is ahead of the deployed version. If you use appcfg version 1.9.20 or above, it includes source hints for the debugger to display the correct version of the source. more info here: https://cloud.google.com/tools/cloud-debugger/setting-up-on-app-engine

2. The 'Watch Target' selected in the UI is inactive. If the application is deployed while using the Cloud Debugger UI. It does not give an indication that the selected 'minorversion' is inactive and the snapshot will never hit. Refresh the UI after deploying to allow the UI to pick the latest minorversion of the application.

3. Make sure that your application is executing that file:line. The file:line has to execute for the debugger to capture an execution snapshot. It may happen that the requests that the application is processing do not execute that specific file and line.

4. Make sure that the the specified condition actually evaluate to true. First simple check is to simply remove the condition.