Reading code through debugging

Question

Suppose you are tasked with understanding which software is very complex, has a dependency network, and a loaded namespace. Let's say this is a compiler controller that is more or less undocumented.

Is there any codified concept or name for a method in which one "registers" the values ​​of variables at runtime to find out how the software works? Or maybe only for the scope of this function? I assume that this will exist primarily as a debugging tool.

In my specific case, I work with F #, so it would be useful if you had a specific link.

Answer 1

What you are looking for is a tool that supports inspectors , tracers , watches (global and local) and context-sensitive evaluators . Some editors may have plugins to enable this. Starting with (2017) LightTable-FSharp for the Color Chart , which shows the built-in evaluator. Thank.