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.NET Compiler -- DEBUG vs. RELEASE

Asked 2008-08-26T19:20:09.470
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For years I have been using the DEBUG compiler constant in VB.NET to write messages to the console. I've also been using System.Diagnostics.Debug.Write in similar fashion. It was always my understanding that when RELEASE was used as the build option, that all of these statements were left out by the compiler, freeing your production code of the overhead of debug statements. Recently when working with Silverlight 2 Beta 2, I noticed that Visual Studio actually attached to a RELEASE build that I was running off of a public website and displayed DEBUG statements which I assumed weren't even compiled! Now, my first inclination is to assume that that there is something wrong with my environment, but I also want to ask anyone with deep knowledge on System.Diagnostics.Debug and the DEBUG build option in general what I may be misunderstanding here.

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I read the article too, and it led me to believe that when DEBUG was not defined, that the ConditionalAttribute declared on System.Debug functions would cause the compiler to leave out this code completely. I assume the same thing to be true for TRACE. That is, the System.Diagnostics.Debug functions must have ConditionalAttributes for DEBUG and for TRACE. I was wrong in that assumption. The separate Trace class has the same functions, and these define ConditionalAttribute dependent on the TRACE constant.

From System.Diagnostics.Debug: _ Public Shared Sub Write ( _ message As String _ )

From System.Diagnostics.Trace: _ Public Shared Sub WriteLine ( _ message As String _ )

It seems then that my original assumption was correct, that System.Diagnostics.Debug (or system.Diagnostics.Trace) statements are actually not included in compilation as if they were included in #IF DEBUG (or #IF TRACE) regions.

But I've also learned here from you guys, and verified, that the RELEASE build does not in itself take care of this. At least with Silverlight projects, which are still a little flaky, you need to get into the "Advanced Compile Options..." and make sure DEBUG is not defined.

We jumped from .NET 1.1/VS2003 to .NET 3.5/VS2008 so I think some of this used to work differently, but perhaps it changed in 2.0/VS2005.

answered 2008-08-26T19:50:28.523

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