Debug a Python app by using Cloud Debugger

Debug a Python app by using Cloud Debugger

This quickstart shows you how to use Cloud Debugger to debug the state of a simple Python app running on App Engine. This quickstart shows you how to accomplish the following:

• Inspect local variables and the call stack
• Generate logging statements
• Set snapshot conditions and use expressions

Before you begin

1. Sign in to your Google Cloud account. If you're new to Google Cloud, create an account to evaluate how our products perform in real-world scenarios. New customers also get $300 in free credits to run, test, and deploy workloads.

2. In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page, select or create a Google Cloud project.

   Note: If you don't plan to keep the resources that you create in this procedure, create a project instead of selecting an existing project. After you finish these steps, you can delete the project, removing all resources associated with the project.

   Go to project selector

3. Make sure that billing is enabled for your Cloud project. Learn how to check if billing is enabled on a project.

4. Install the Google Cloud CLI.

5. To initialize the gcloud CLI, run the following command:

   gcloud init

6. In the Google Cloud console, on the project selector page, select or create a Google Cloud project.

   Note: If you don't plan to keep the resources that you create in this procedure, create a project instead of selecting an existing project. After you finish these steps, you can delete the project, removing all resources associated with the project.

   Go to project selector

7. Make sure that billing is enabled for your Cloud project. Learn how to check if billing is enabled on a project.

8. Install the Google Cloud CLI.

9. To initialize the gcloud CLI, run the following command:

   gcloud init

10. Make sure that the following software is installed on your local system:
• Git
• Google Cloud CLI

Deploy sample app to App Engine

Start by deploying a Python 3.7 app to App Engine.

1. Clone the app to your local computer:

   git clone https://github.com/GoogleCloudPlatform/python-docs-samples.git
   

2. Navigate to the directory that contains the app:

   cd python-docs-samples/appengine/standard_python3/cloud_debugger
   

3. Deploy the app to App Engine by issuing the following command:

   gcloud app deploy
   

   When prompted, select the region where you want your App Engine app located.

4. View the app by issuing the following command:

   gcloud app browse
   

   If a browser window does not automatically open displaying the app, click the URL that appears in the terminal.

   The app contains a prompt to enter a string with the field already prepopulated.

   

   Note: If you have problems getting the app deployed, refer to the App Engine Quickstart for Python 3 in the App Engine standard environment.

5. Click Submit.

   

You see two results after clicking submit. One is labeled Program Output and shows the output from the Reverse method in the source code. The other is labeled Correct Output and is the output from Python's reverse list functionality.

The Program Output and the Correct Output should be identical. However, there's a problem with the source code. Use Debugger to diagnose the issue.

View deployed source code

After you have deployed your app, you can view the deployed source code on the Google Cloud console Debug page.

1. Navigate to the Debug page in the Google Cloud console:

   Go to Debug page

2. Make sure you have the correct project selected:

   

3. Confirm Debugger has access to the deployed files by verifying that Deployed files is selected and the app's files are present:

   

   Note: For ways to uploaded source code to Debugger, see Selecting source code automatically or Selecting source code manually.

4. Make sure the correct version of your app is selected:

   

   App Engine maintains all the deployed versions of an app. When using Debugger, verify that you have the correct version of the app selected.

   After selecting the main.py file, you see the following block of code:

   try:
     import googleclouddebugger
     googleclouddebugger.enable()
   except ImportError:
      pass
   
   import logging
   logging.basicConfig(level=logging.INFO)
   

   This section imports and enables the Debugger agent using a try and except block :

   try:
     import googleclouddebugger
     googleclouddebugger.enable()
   except ImportError:
      pass
   

   This section configures logging:

   import logging
   logging.basicConfig(level=logging.INFO)
   

   Note: For information on setting up Debugger, go to Setting up Debugger.

You are now ready to take debug snapshots and inject debug logpoints to diagnose the problem in the source code.

Take a debug snapshot

A debug snapshot captures the local variables and call stack that are in scope at a line location.

1. To take a debug snapshot, click the line number that contains the tmp variable. A blue arrow appears indicating that a snapshot is set, and the results panel displays "Waiting for snapshot to hit."

   

2. To trigger your snapshot, refresh the page.

   The Variables pane shows the values of the variables. See that the chars array was correctly populated on the first pass through the loop. The problem is not present here because the snapshot was taken the first time the breakpoint was hit.

   

   The Call Stack pane shows the results of the call stack. You can click on the functions in the Call Stack pane to see the local variables and parameters at that point in the code. When you click on ReverseString, you see that the input was correct.

   

Since taking a snapshot and inspecting the variables and call stack didn't reveal the problem, use logpoints to track down the problem.

Inject a debug logpoint

A debug logpoint enables you to inject logging into your running app without restarting it.

1. To insert a logpoint, select the Logpoint tab.

2. Click the line number that contains the tmp variable. An inline text box appears. Populate the fields as follows and click Add:

   if (True) logpoint("About to swap two characters. Chars is currently {chars}")
   

   

   A logpoint has the following structure: if(condition)logpoint(string). To create a logpoint, you supply two parts:

   • A condition, which must written in the in syntax of the source code.

   • A string, which can contain any number of expressions in curly braces written in the syntax of the source code.

3. To verify that the logpoint has been injected successfully, select the Logpoint History tab.

   

4. To trigger the logpoint, refresh the page.

5. To see the logs generated by the logpoint, select the Logs panel and click refresh .

   

   Note: Debugger logpoints can also be viewed in the Logs Explorer console in Cloud Logging.

Diagnosing the issue

The logpoints indicate that the while loop executes three times, but it only needs to execute two times. Since the logpoint is set at the beginning of the loop, it logged that it was about to swap characters on a string that was already fully reversed.

To pinpoint the problem, use a debug snapshot with a condition.

Take a debug snapshot using a condition

The app uses the left variable and right variable to track when to stop swapping values. When the left variable is greater than the right variable, the loop should terminate.

Snapshots can be set to trigger based on a condition in the source code. Since you know when the loop should terminate, use a snapshot with a condition to isolate the problem.

1. To determine why the loop executes too many times, set the snapshot to trigger on the following condition: left > right. Then click the camera icon to prepare Debugger for the snapshot.

   

2. Trigger the snapshot by refreshing the page. The Variables pane shows that the left variable is greater than the right variable.

   Since the left variable is already greater than the right variable at this point in the loop, it means that as the loop continues, it will swap the values one more time before it reaches line 50 and exits the loop.

   

Take a debug snapshot using an expression

Debugger also lets you retrieve programming-language expressions when the snapshot is triggered. For example, you can retrieve the values in the chars array with expressions like chars[1] and chars[2].

1. To get the value of an expression when a snapshot is triggered, write the expression in the Expression field. You can enter multiple expressions.

   After the snapshot triggers, the expression values appear above the Variables pane.

   

Fixing the issue

Snapshots and logpoints help diagnose the problem in the app. In this example, the while loop executes too many times because the statement that stops the loop, if left >= right: break is reached too late to stop the last iteration. To fix the problem, move if left >= right: break from line 50 to line 47.

Clean up

To avoid incurring charges to your Google Cloud account for the resources used on this page, follow these steps.

1. Navigate to the Projects page of the Google Cloud console.

2. Click Delete next to your project.

3. Type your project name to confirm the shutdown.

What's next

• Learn more about setting up the Debugger

• Learn more about using the Debugger

• Read our resources about DevOps and explore our research program.