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Software Engineering vocabulary · Debugging and Troubleshooting

Debug

Meaning in software engineering, with examples

/diːˈbʌɡ/verbCore term

In software engineering, debug means: To search for the cause of a problem in a program and remove it, often by running the code step by step and checking values.

In Turkish: hata ayıklamak, hatanın kaynağını bulmak

How it is used

Developers debug code, a crash or a failing test. You debug locally, attach a debugger or, carefully, debug in production. The -ing form is very common: 'I spent the morning debugging.'

Example sentences

  1. I spent two hours debugging a test that only failed on Mondays.

  2. Can you help me debug this? The API returns an empty list.

Common collocations

  • debug an issue
  • debug locally
  • debug a crash
  • debugging session
  • use a debugger
  • bugA mistake in a program that makes it behave in a way nobody intended, such as showing wrong results, freezing or closing suddenly.
  • breakpointA marker you put on a line of code so that the program pauses there while it runs, letting you inspect variables and step through the code.
  • stack traceA report printed when an error happens, listing the chain of function calls that led to it, with file names and line numbers.
  • logA record of events, messages and errors that a program writes while it runs, used later to understand what happened. Also a verb: to log an error.
  • reproduceTo make a bug happen again on purpose by following the same steps, so that you can see it yourself and find its cause.

This word in other fields

The same English word can have a different meaning in another field:

More terms: Debugging and Troubleshooting

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