So I’ve got a huge page full of lovely jQuery script and it all works fine in Firefox.
In IE – not so good. Occasionally it’ll give me a little error in the lower left status bar. But that’s about it. I’m digging around looking for a Firebug for IE but so far haven’t found much. The few ‘plugins’ and toolbars I’ve found are just about as flaky as IE itself. Either it doesn’t work – or I disable it and it continues to run. Lovely.
So does anyone have any suggestions or tools for debugging javascript within IE7?
It is really sad this browser is still such a crappy bit of software. I know my life would be much easier if Microsoft just pulled the plug on it and told everyone “Hey we built a piece of crap. Sorry. Switch to Firefox.”
But I doubt that will ever happen. Thanks Microsoft.
This seems to be the best option:
Script Debugger for Windows NT 4.0 and Later
http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2004/10/26/247912.aspx
Shortcut(http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=2f465be0-94fd-4569-b3c4-dffdf19ccd99&displaylang=en)
MS Office comes with an optional pretty descent debugger. Visual Studio should work too.
I don’t know that I’d blame the lack of a debuging tool on a browser… after all, Firefox nor Sarafi come with any real Javascript debuggers. These are plugins, and not even made by the developers who make the browsers.
IE has come a long way. Firefox on the other hand is taking a step back. It’s performance and stability as of late have been horrific. Firefox crashes a minimum of 5x a day on me (I’m a Firefox user) regardless of which version I’m running. I can’t even get Safari to run on Windows…
So, comparing oranges to oranges, I’ve almost prepared myself to switch to IE. But then again it comes back to lack of a Javascript debugger. Firebug in IE sucks, so what other options are there? If anyone else has a good debugger I’d also be interested!
The closest thing I know of is the IE Developer toolbar:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?familyid=e59c3964-672d-4511-bb3e-2d5e1db91038&displaylang=en
The best debugger for IE is Script Editor that comes with MS Office. The free JavaScript debugger that MS offers on their download site sucks.
So go into Office setup, and under some addons/extras there’s MS Script Editor. Install that and IE will use it as JS debugger. Google for detailed instructions.
Here ya go. There are lots of good tools on this page. Some cost money and some don’t. Try a few and see what works for you.
http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2007/06/22/from-microsoft-teched-2007-web-development-tools-for-internet-explorer.aspx
Thanks all!
@Joe – the IE Developer toolbar doesn’t offer any debugging :(
Erki – I’ve read a few things and assumed the Script editor and the download were the same – I’ll dig up an Office CD tomorrow and check that out.
@Rostislav – I did find a tutorial on how to hook up the free Visual Studio version which I may try tomorrow.
Introducing: Firebug-Lite!
The Firebug for Non-Firefox browsers!
http://www.getfirebug.com/lite.html
These two tools from the same company are nowhere near what firebug provides (such as step debugging), but provide some insight into js/css issues, http request/responses, and a console in IE:
Debug Bar
http://www.my-debugbar.com/wiki/ToDo/Beta
Companion.JS
http://www.ieforge.com/CompanionJS/HomePage
It’s possible to attach Visual Studio to the IE process and do proper debugging with breakpoints and such, including when the code is not ASP.NET. It’s been improved in 2008, but also works in 2005:
http://weblogs.asp.net/scottgu/archive/2007/07/19/vs-2008-javascript-debugging.aspx
Just to follow this up – seems I’m not the only one – the comments on this post “The First Year of IE7″ are hilarious.
http://blogs.msdn.com/ie/archive/2007/11/30/the-first-year-of-ie7.aspx?CommentPosted=true#commentmessage
Ouch – this is really snowballing…
http://www.computerworld.com/action/article.do?command=viewArticleBasic&articleId=9050979&intsrc=hm_list
Firebug lite works well for non-firefox browsers. It seems weird you are having IE specific problems with jQuery – I’ve only ran into that once in the last year with Ajax + Google Maps.
Bill Gates weighs in:
http://www.molly.com/2007/12/05/conversation-with-bill-gates-about-ie8-and-microsoft-transparency/
Just to followup – a nice post here:
http://www.adaptavist.com/display/~gfraser/2007/11/09/Script+debugging+in+MS+Internet+Exploder
Eventually ends up using Aptana Pro?!
there is a blog post that talks about “best” options for debugging js in ie.
http://notetodogself.blogspot.com/2008/08/debug-javascript-in-ie.html