Variables should reflect changes made by the user in the debug console

[rkeithhill]

If the user modifies, add or removes a variable in the debug console during a debug stop, that should be reflected after execution of their command.

We will probably need to re-fetch the variables as we can't rely on examining the executed expression for simple variable assignment. The user could be using Add/Clear/Remove/Set-Variable or they may be manipulating the variable drive.

[daviwil]

One problem we'll have here is that VS Code doesn't give us a way to notify the editor that variables have changed need to be refreshed. We may be able to ask for this though!

[rkeithhill]

OK that has been addressed by the VSCode team. Yay!

[daviwil]

Awesome news.

[rkeithhill]

Oops. Re-opening this as it is a separate issue from the variable dirty indicator and it is not fixed. :-)

[daviwil]

Ahhh I guess it's not being updated when the user types in something that changes a variable value :) Makes sense. We'd need some way to signal variable changes to them. I wonder if this is even something they'd be interested in adding? Will probably require a feature request here:

https://.com/Microsoft/vscode-debugadapter-node

[rkeithhill]

If they want to better support REPL friendly languages I think they would want this. I also think it would be slick if they allowed the user to edit a variable's value directly in the "variables" tree view while the debugger is stopped. Of course, the debug adapter would need to support such an operation.

[daviwil]

I seem to recall that they have the desire to allow variable editing, but I can't remember if that was a bug on the VS Code repo or from some e-mail thread. Either way, I think you're right, they'll definitely need to have the variable tree up to date for REPL friendly languages.

[TylerLeonhardt]

Circling back to this. If I modify the value in the debug console and step over in the debugger, the value does change:

Is this what this issue was about or was it more about changing the variable and have it immediately updated in the debug pane?

[daviwil]

Right, they don't give us a way to notify the UI that the variable has changed "out of band" so there's currently not a way to accomplish this (that I'm aware of).