How to create a breakpoint programmatically on Android

Question

In C# I can write:

if(Debugger.IsAttached)
    Debugger.Break();

This has no effect when the program is not being debugged. When a debugger is attached, it behaves like a breakpoint that can never be turned off. How can I achieve similar effect on Android?

Or maybe I should not focus on breakpoints at all. What I really want is to have no consequence in regular use (a generic error message will be shown to the user), but have the source of error become obvious the moment a dev will start looking at it. I've tried assert, but it's a sub-project that's compiled to release flavor most of the time and I can't rely on someone remembering to switch it to debug.

Answer 1

I think that Debug.isDebuggerConnected() is what you are looking for. This will return true only if the app is started with debugger attached and false otherwise, no matter of build type or flavor. Unfortunately, I don't think that you can stop the execution programatically, but with the above instruction you should be able to display an error message or throw an exception. Personally, I'm thinking to something like this:

if (Debug.isDebuggerConnected()) {
    // throw an exception for the developer with a detailed message
} else {
    // show the general error message to the user with a dialog/toast    
}

Answer 2

If i clear understand you - try this snippet of code:

if (BuildConfig.DEBUG) {
        // Your, developers behavior
    }
    else {
        // release behavior
    }

Answer 3

I was also hoping that this could be done, but I've not found any reasonable way to programmatically cause the debugger to breakpoint. What I've done to get around this problem is to create a breakpoint class with a method call "br". When I'm debugging, I'll set a breakpoint in the "br" method. After that, whenever my code calls the "br" method, the debugger stops. I then step out of that method and then inspect the state of the program where the "br" method was called. Hope that helps!