Language Protocols for Domain-Specific Debugging

Interactive debuggers are valuable tools to localize defects within programs, but are costly to implement. We argue that existing solutions to generate or configure debuggers for DSLs are not fully satisfying. In this work, we present a novel debugging architecture tailored for the debugging of heterogeneous DSLs, while limiting the effort required from language engineers. This approach enables the use of domain-specific debugging operations, such as breakpoint types and step types. Our architecture relies on language protocols, including a reinterpretation of DAP for the integration of a configurable domain-specific debugger within existing IDEs.