Today, we use an enormous number of software for our daily tasks such as MS Word, Browsers, Mobile applications, Photoshop tools, etc. All of these make our life and work easier. This software, when created by the developers, would have undergone some main phases, such as Requirements specifications, designing, coding, testing, implementing and maintaining. So, here when the coding is done, they test the software whether there are any errors, whether it is functioning properly or not, etc. In this phase there may be a lot of errors and issues that would rise. But they need to be solved to get the best software for your clients.
The process of identifying and removing the errors from the system is called Debugging.
Though it may be a programmatic code in the software or any hardware component, you can debug errors by identifying and fixing them in your system. Firstly, if you want to solve the error, isolate that component and test it separately and then debug it so that you can fix it without confusion. Some of the bugs can even be solved by the user such as checking and fixing the bad internet connection or addressing the issues of slow systems, etc. He may have to learn a little about that particular error and how to solve it. Debugging exactly means the finding and fixing that error. The one who does this process is called Debugger.
It may be a personal application program or a commercial product or an enterprise application, any hardware and software component needs Debugging. There are different types of testing. If there is an error in the smallest part of the system, then we do the unit testing. If a bug is created by a group of units called components, then we perform component testing. We call it system testing when many components and parts are brought together for testing as a whole. This is a very costly process. There is also beta testing, where the product is tried once in the real world scenarios for its functionalities.
It is obvious that any new application contains many lines of code in software and many devices and components in hardware aspect. So, there will surely be a chance of bugs in any of them. There are various stages of an extent of bugs such as low, medium, high, intolerable. The bugs with low danger can be ignored. But the intolerable stage of bugs must be addressed soon or else they might cause disastrous effects to the system. Early versions and release of the system contains many bugs and such program is termed as “buggy.”
There are different Debugging tools usually called debuggers are used find the bugs. These are implemented at different stages of software development for identify coding errors. Some of the frameworks and platforms are being used now-a-days which identify some of the errors while being written only. This leads to fewer bugs during the time of testing.
Simple bugs can be fixed soon using fewer resources, but complex errors might include tiresome tasks, scheduling updates, analysis, data collection, etc.
