Watching variables in SSIS during debug

Question

I have a project in SSIS and I've added an Execute SQL Task which sends its result out to a variable. I wanted to confirm the value because I was worried that it would try to write it out as a resultset object rather than an actual integer (in this case I'm returning a COUNT).

My first thought was just to run it in debug mode and add the global variable to my Watch window. Unfortunately, when I right-click on the Watch window, the option to "Add Variable" is greyed out. What am I missing here?

I've gotten around confirming that my variable is set correctly, so I'm not interested in methods like putting a script in to do a MsgBox with the value or anything like that. For future reference I'd like to be able to watch variables in debug mode. If there are some kind of constraints on that then I'd like to know the what and why of it all if anyone knows.

The help is woefully inadequate on this one and every "tutorial" that I can find just says, "Add the variable to the Watch window and debug" as though there should never be a problem doing that.

Thanks for any insight!

Answer 1

I believe you can only add variables to the Watch window while the debugger is stopped on a breakpoint. If you set a breakpoint on a step, you should be able to enter variables into the Watch window when the breakpoint is hit. You can select the first empty row in the Watch window and enter the variable name (you may or may not get some Intellisense there, I can't remember how well that works.)

Answer 2

Drag the variable from Variables pane to Watch pane and voila!

Answer 3

I know this is very old and possibly talking about an older version of Visual studio and so this might not have been an option before but anyway, my way would be when at a breakpoint use the locals window to see all current variable values ( Debug >> Windows >> Locals )

Answer 4

Visual Studio 2013: Yes to both adding to the watch windows during debugging and dragging variables or typing them in without "user::". But before any of that would work I also needed to go to Tools > Options, then Debugging > General and had to scroll right down to the bottom of the right hand pane to be able to tick "Use Managed Compatibility Mode". Then I had to stop and restart debugging. Finally the above advice worked. Many thanks to the above and to this article: Visual Studio 2015 Debugging: Can't expand local variables?