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Debugging and Iterating with Cascade

Debugging and Iterating with Cascade

Learn how to collaboratively debug and guide Cascade using stack traces, runtime errors, and targeted correction strategies.

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In our last lesson, we mastered the art of contextual prompt engineering. We learned how to provide Cascade with precise information using @-mentions, @docs, and @web, allowing us to modify our Snake game and add a new sound effects feature. We have become adept at giving effective instructions.

But what happens when things go wrong?

This lesson focuses on one of the most critical and common activities in a developer’s life: debugging. We will explore what happens when code, whether written by a human or an AI, fails. You will learn how Cascade’s agentic nature fundamentally changes the debugging process, turning it from a frustrating, solitary hunt into a powerful, collaborative partnership. We have learned to give our co-pilot a flight plan; now we will learn how to work with them when they encounter unexpected turbulence.

The inevitability of bugs and the AI’s role

Let’s start by setting a realistic expectation: AI-generated code is not infallible. Just like code written by the most senior human engineer, it can contain bugs. It might misunderstand a subtle requirement, fail to account for an edge case, or break due to an unexpected change in its environment.

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A simple code generator, when it produces a bug, has failed. Its job is done, and the responsibility to fix it is entirely on you. This is the key difference with an agentic AI like Cascade. For an agent, a failure is not an endpoint; it’s new information. A crash log or an error message is simply another piece of data to perceive and incorporate into its next attempt.

Let’s get started. We’ll intentionally introduce a bug into our Snake game and then work with Cascade to diagnose and fix it.

A classic typo

This is a bug every developer has spent far too long chasing. In your game.js file (or wherever your main game logic resides), find the part of the code that handles collision detection with the walls. Once a collision is detected, a showGameOver function is called to display the game over screen.

Let’s introduce a typo. Change showGameOver to showGame0ver in just one place inside that loop. Your code might go from this:

// Before
// Check for collisions with self
if (this.snake.some(segment => segment.x === head.x && segment.z === head.z)) {
    this.showGameOver();
    return;
}
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