AppWorks app debugging on devices

Mikhail_Dikov

Can an AppWorks app be debugged on iOS or Android device using the native USB debugging tools for each platform.

If the app runs in a webView it should work fine, however I am not able to pull it off with AppWorks app.

Werner de Jong

Hi Mikhail,

There is a brief article that describes debugging AppWorks apps on iOS devices. Is that what you are looking for?

Thanks,

Werner

Ben_Barth

Remotely debugging the AppWorks web views on iOS or Android is not available at this time.

For now, alert() is your bestfriend.

Mikhail_Dikov

@Werner yes this is what I meant. I am using this regularly but for some reason it did not work with my app works app. I confirmed that my setup works with remote debugging on Safari. And I have been using with generic Cordova apps.

@Ben is there a specific reason why this would not work? I have tested on Cordova apps both the iOS remote debugging Werner pointed out and the Android USB debugging and the both work well for Cordova apps. https://developers.google.com/chrome-developer-tools/docs/remote-debugging

alert() is really not debugging

Mikhail_Dikov

For Android I have a bit better setup now. If you install ADT and the platform tools you can connect the device with USB and have the log displayed on your computer. A step above alert http://developer.android.com/tools/help/logcat.html

Also I find that a file explorer such as ES File Explorer is very handy because you can make small changes to the files on the device and save the deployment roundtrip. Only works for small changes and adding console.logs from the device. However ES File Explorer allows you to publish the device file system as ftp server and then you can use filezilla or any ftp client to edit the file and save it on the device. Once again saving a deployment round trip and giving a bit more comfort in editing the file.

Marcin Pacyga

I haven't tested it by myself with AppWorks yet but there is high chance that Weinre would be working well for debugging.

weinre is a debugger for web pages, like FireBug (for FireFox) and Web Inspector (for WebKit-based browsers), except it's designed to work remotely, and in particular, to allow you debug web pages on a mobile device such as a phone.

http://people.apache.org/~pmuellr/weinre/docs/latest/

Anyone have any experience?

jdonpaul

When I debug apps, what Werner mentioned earlier about the article for debugging apps is what I would do in addition to setting up external tools like "Fiddler" or "Wireshark" in a reverse proxy mode:

http://fiddler2.com/documentation/Configure-Fiddler/Tasks/UseFiddlerAsReverseProxy
http://blogs.it.ox.ac.uk/inapickle/2012/11/10/proxying-https-sites-for-debugging-using-wireshark/

With using the reverse proxies, you can see what communication is happening between the app and server. I find that GETs and POSTs are easier to read in fiddler or wireshark. I will also use Postman(Google app) to assist in debugging REST API calls.

All in all, there are multiple ways in debugging your apps. It is a matter of finding a method that you are comfortable with.

NobleJo Mathew

Used alert in the app deployed for debugging purpose. But when I access the app using Appwork Desktop client, alerts are not getting triggered. Can anyone suggest solution how app can be debugged using alerts using Appwork Desktop client.