Debugging ASP Applications

Although the primary focus of Web debugging in Visual Studio 2010 is ASP.NET, you can also debug legacy ASP Web applications.

ASP Web applications consist of scripts, which run on the client in .htm files and on the server in .asp files; the Global.asa file; and .cdf files. Scripts can be in VBScript, JScript, or a mix of VBScript and JScript. They may also be mixed with HTML code and COM objects. You can debug ASP Web applications containing all of these elements.

In Visual Studio, you can debug client-side script running on your local machine by attaching to a local copy of Internet Explorer. To debug script running on Microsoft Internet Information Services, you can attach to IIS on your local machine.

ASP code executes in the Internet Information Services (IIS) process (in-process execution) or in a separate Mtx.exe process (out-of-process execution). To debug ASP code, you must attach to the IIS or Mtx.exe process. To debug client-side script as well, you must also attach to the IIS process. For information on how to attach to processes, see Attaching to Running Processes.

When you attach to an ASP Web application, make sure you select the appropriate program types in the Attach To Process dialog box. When you debug script, Managed code must not be selected. You cannot debug script and managed code at the same time in Visual Studio 2005.

In This Section

• Debugging ASP.NET and AJAX Applications
  Describes the steps you need to perform in IIS to prepare for ASP debugging.

• How to: Debug ASP Errors with Just-In-Time Debugging
  Describes how to use Just-In-Time debugging to launch the debugger automatically when an ASP error occurs.

• How to: Debug Global.asa files
  Discusses debugging considerations specific to Global.asa files.

• Debugging Script Objects in ASP Pages
  Discusses considerations in debugging script objects in ASP pages, including the script object model, script library, enabling script object debugging, and tracing.

• How to: Enable Script Debugging in Internet Explorer
  Script debugging in Internet Explorer is disabled by default. To use Visual Studio to debug script running in Internet Explorer, you must follow this procedure.

• Understanding ASP Script Processing
  Provides a conceptual overview of how ASP script is processed.

See Also

Concepts

Debugger Security

Other Resources

Debugging in Visual Studio

Debug Settings and Preparation

Debugger Roadmap

Change History