Recently, I've been trying to become more standards aware and design using XHTML and CSS. I've been using alot of layers and positioning and have found that when I do this, many designs cause ColdFusion's debugging output to slide underneath the other content in my browser rather than displaying at the bottom of the page. This is very very annoying...
I've found that the problem can be overcome fairly easily be generating an alternate debug format and switching to it when needed. In today's case, the site I am working on is a fixed width of 790px, so I altered the debug template to slide all the debug data to the right by 800px. This makes the debug info start at the top of the page just to the right of the page's content. If I need it, I just scroll to the right (instead of down as I previously would have).
If you think this trick could help you out, here's how to do it:
- Make a copy of /cfusionmx/wwwroot/WEB-INF/debug/classic.cfm and rename it - I used classic-right.cfm for the name.
- Open the new file in your editor of choice and scroll down to around line 160.
- Add the following to the style block ##debugright {margin-left: 800px;}
- Then wrap the output in <div id="debugright"></div> (starting near line 182 and ending near 656)
- Save the new debug file.
- Go into the Debugging section of the CFAdmin and change to the new template.
- Done!
Your mileage may vary depending on your design, and you might have other changes you'd like to make while you are in the debugging template. Tinker around, there's alot of interesting stuff in there...
