debug-intellij.md

Title	Added	Last reviewed
Remote debugging using IntelliJ	v3.0.0	2021-02-09

Remote debugging using IntelliJ

All the projects generated using the Alfresco SDK 4.x are pre-configured to listen for remote debug connections. Depending on the selected archetypes you'll have a port for remotely debugging ACS, share or both of them.

By default, the remote debug port for ACS is 8888 and for share is 9898. This configuration can be changed through the maven properties acs.debug.port and share.debug.port in the pom.xml file of the main project.

    <!-- Environment configuration properties -->
    <share.port>8180</share.port>
    <share.debug.port>9898</share.debug.port>
    <acs.host>${artifactId}-acs</acs.host>
    <acs.port>8080</acs.port>
    <acs.debug.port>8888</acs.debug.port>

These remote debug ports are configured in the docker compose file to be exposed by the corresponding docker containers.

services:
  sample-project-share:
...
    environment:
      CATALINA_OPTS: "-agentlib:jdwp=transport=dt_socket,server=y,suspend=n,address=0.0.0.0:8888"
      REPO_HOST: sample-project-acs
      REPO_PORT: 8080
    ports:
      - "${share.port}:8080"
      - "${share.debug.port}:8888"
  sample-project-acs:
...
    environment:
      CATALINA_OPTS: "-agentlib:jdwp=transport=dt_socket,server=y,suspend=n,address=0.0.0.0:8888"
    ports:
      - "${acs.port}:8080"
      - "${acs.debug.port}:8888"
...

Configuring remote debugging using IntelliJ

Here you'll see how to create and manage a configuration to remotely debug your launched Alfresco project that's waiting for a connection. This assumes you have an IntelliJ IDEA IDE up and running, and have already imported the same project you are going to debug.

For more details on how to import an Alfresco project into your IntelliJ IDEA IDE, see Setting up your development environment using Intellij IDEA.

1. Open the IntelliJ IDEA IDE and click on Add/Edit Configurations (top right).

2. Click on the plus icon (top left) and select Remote to add a new configuration for a remote app.

3. Enter a descriptive name for your configuration, for example, Sample project ACS debug.

4. Check that your settings match the screenshot. This is a sample to debug ACS. If you want to debug share or you have configured custom ports for remote debugging you'll need to modify that configuration. If you're working with Docker Toolbox instead of Docker Desktop the host to access the container won't be localhost but a configured IP address (i.e. 192.168.99.100).

5. Click OK.

You will be taken back to the project source code.

6. Click on the Edit Configurations dropdown box and select the new configuration to run it.

The IDE connects the source code with the deployed one at the docker container. Once the code is linked, you can open a browser and start using your application. In our case, we are going to test the behaviour of debugging by running the sample webscript.

7. Open your browser and type http://localhost:8080/alfresco/s/sample/helloworld.

This is a sample webscript generated in every project created using SDK 4.x and the platform artifact.

Now let's find the HelloWorldWebScript.java file in the src/main/java/.../platformsample folder of your project. If you're using an All-In-One project, the folder is located in the platform sub-project.

8. Edit the file using IntelliJ IDEA IDE and set a breakpoint (by clicking to the left of the line number) at line:

model.put(“fromJava”,”HelloFromJava”);

9. Refresh the browser. IntelliJ IDEA will intercept the execution at the breakpoint:

From here the management is the same as for a regular Java application using your preferred IDE. Please note that the whole Alfresco source code is available at debug time, thanks to the local maven repository.