Possible to change Visual Web Dev without stop/start recompiling whilst debugging?

Question

Hi --

This may be a stupid question, but I'll feel stupider if I don't ask and find out in 12 months that it was possible (this happened when I realized I could do what I'm requesting below with .aspx files).

Is it possible to change my project files (c# classes, which predominate in an asp.net mvc environment) without recompiling whilst debugging? Specifically, if I find a bug while stepping through code, I want to avoid stopping the debugging, then restarting, and all the associated waiting.

Thanks, James

Answer 1

Yes. Set breakpoints around where you want to change the code. Also, you must for each project go to Project -> [Project Name] Properties, click on the Web tab ... under servers check Enable Edit and Continue. You will only be able to do this if you're using the Visual Studio Dev Server (which you should always do in my opinion). If you find that problematic to deploy than just downloda the Web Deployment Project add-on.

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=0AA30AE8-C73B-4BDD-BB1B-FE697256C459&displaylang=en

Regards.

Answer 2

You can do this to a limited degree, it's called "Edit and Continue". You're allowed to modify values of variables, and move the "current line" arrow indicator to some other line to immediately jump/skip to that code.

Here's a blog post showing how to enable that.

What you can't do is full scale editing - changing methods, adding properties or basically changing the way your class would be compiling.

Note that you can also use the Immediate Window to execute arbitrary code while debugging. This can be a great way to play around with changing your variable values and executing functions that exist in your code.