Xcode 4.2 not debugging properly

Question

I've imported an iPhone app that I have developed for iOS and am now maintaining it. I've came across a couple of bugs when trying to add to the iPhone's calendar, which I'm happy to try and sort out myself with a bit of debugging.

One problem is that when I go to run the application on the iPhone simulator, it seems to run an older version of the app than the one I am running. I've removed and added another button since then and the old button is still showing when I run it in the simulator. However, when I compile and run this on a device, it loads the correct version and displays the correct version number in the 'about' view.

But... my main problem is that it doesn't seem to debug on the device properly. The app actually works fine except for the calendar problems, but if I put a few breakpoints in so I can see exactly where this is going wrong, it just doesn't seem to step through! The app pauses, and Xcode says the app has paused! I can press step over and continue execution etc and it appears to work, but I can't see it stepping over the code, nor can I hover over variables to see their values.

I've tried reinstalling Xcode multiple times (I did have a problem installing an older version, so I had to wait until the next version was available before Xcode would install).

The stress is: Today is my last day at work, and I'd really like to get this app ready for iOS 5 before I leave.

Has anyone seen these symptoms before? Is there a debug setting that I've missed? Or is it a corrupted installation?

I wish I could help people a bit with more information, but I don't even know where to start looking here. Any code I can post? any settings? (not too familiar with this, I'm a .NET guy usually).

Thanks!

Answer 1

Have you checked which debugger is being used GDB or LLDB? Select Edit Scheme from the Product menu, and see what the Debugger setting is under the Debug scheme. You could try switching between GDB, LLDB, and None and running in between.

Answer 2

I've had the exact same problem with a project that I started on xcode 3 and then switched to xcode 4. What fixed it for me was changing the compiler in the project settings.

The default compiler up to xcode 3 was gcc, while the default compiler on xcode 4 is LLVM gcc.

Now, I don't know exactly what's the issue that gdb could have with LLVM gcc, but switching the compiler back to gcc in my project settings and doing a clean build fixed my debugging issues.

Might be worth a try.

Answer 3

Sorry you're going through a tough moment there Connell; as you said you're not too familiar with all this, I'm laying down a few steps which might help you out. Some are pretty basic, yes, but I've resolved to these steps myself several times when I've encountered similar scenarios;

• If you're testing on the simulator, do a 'Reset Content and Settings' from the 'iOS Simulator' main menu. This will remove all old data and settings and give you a clean start.
• Do a 'Clean All Targets' from the Build menu. Then go to your physical project folder and delete the Build folder from it altogether before starting to build again.
• Restart both XCode and the Simulator (and your Mac too if possible)
• Make sure the mode is set to Debug and not Release or Distribution
• Even on the device, remove the old app before putting the new one in, and restart it for good measure.
• Delete all Provisioning Profiles from the device and install just the one you need.

On the code;

• I've noted that the app appears to 'pause' like this a couple of times when I had accidentally created an infinite loop in the code. Double check to see whether there's something which may cause this.
• Unless you haven't already done so, throw an NSLog or two in there to see if its really not being executed beyond the breakpoint.