Page is focused on the old Mark II ConTeXt version, though \show... commands are still the same. Work-in-progress page on current LMTX version is Debugging.

There's a whole lot of commands that help you analyzing and debugging your ConTeXt documents. Most of them start with \show... or \trace.... While \showsomething is a command that immediately inserts something, \tracesomethingtrue or ...false is a switch that influences the behaviour of some other commands. You can check the setting with \iftrace.... In the following we leave out the boolean value (true or false).

Unordered

\tracefiles : ?

\tracepositions : ?

\traceposstring : ?

\traceboxplacement : ?

\traceotr : output routine?

\showboxes : show boxes

Document layout and layers

See Document layout and layers/Visual debugging

Bookmarks and References

See References notes and floats/Visual debugging

Fonts and Type

See Characters words and fonts/Visual debugging.

Tables

\tracetables : ?

\traceTABLE : ?

\tracetabulate : ?

Mathematics

\tracemathtrue : show the layout boxes for left, middle, or right-aligned formulas.

\tracemathcommand : ?

\tracemathcollection : ?

\tracemathsymbol{name of math symbol} : show the command (name of symbol) and the symbol itself

\tracemathcollectiontrue
\tracemathsymbol{Re}
\tracemathsymbol{Im}

\tracemathcharacter : ?

Colors

\showcolor : see Color

\showcolorgroup : ?

\showpalet : ?

\tracedgreymode : ?

\tracedgreycolormode : ?

\tracedrgbcolormode : ?

\tracedcmykcolormode : ?

\tracedspotcolormode : ?

Figures

\showexternalfigures : ?

\traceexternalfigures : ?

\tracesidefloats : ?

Interaction

\showfields : ?

\tracefields : ?

\traceJScode : trace JavaScript code

TODO: A lot of commands and switches are still unexplained. (See: To-Do List)

Input and compilation/Visual debugging

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