Document no-op console methods

[unional]

I just noticed starting from Node@8, console.debug() is defined but it is a no-op.

This causes my library to not behaving correctly.

It would be better to at least mention in the documentation that they are there but are no-op.

Are any of these has the same problem?
#1716 (comment)

[maclover7]

relevant #12675

[Tiriel]

Hi there! I'd like to pick this one up as my first contrib to core.
Already forked and built+tested the repo.

Any more information you can give me on this one, just in case?

[Tiriel]

From what I see, based on #12675 and on lib/console.js, these functions are all non-op:

console.debug                 console.dirxml                console.markTimeline
console.profile               console.profileEnd            console.table
console.timeStamp             console.timeline              console.timelineEnd 

Can someone confirm/infirm?

[daguej]

These are NOT actually no-ops!

All of the new-to-node console methods (that @Tiriel listed above) are real implementations for the Inspector. ie, they may appear to be no-ops unless you're running node with the --inspect option and then open chrome://inspect in Chrome and attach to your process. In the inspector's console, you'll see the results of using these methods (eg console.debug, console.profile, etc...); but you will not see anything on stdout.

There is no indication of these methods' existence in lib/console.js because they are not implemented in node. The methods were added by V8 starting with node v8.0 and are copied to node's console global.

---

Also, depending on how #15579 shakes out, this may be moot since that PR may end up removing these undocumented console methods.

[Tiriel]

Thanks for the input @daguej !
I'll check what comes out of this PR and see if this issue needs closing then.

If not, what about adding a new section 'Inspector only methods' explaining the deal and listing these methods?

[Tiriel]

Okay, trying to wrap my head around a first draft just in case.

As a first timer would-be committer, is there anything I should know? Are there some things automatically generated? Am I to write directly yhe markdown in the doc folder or is it somewhere else? In short, if someone as any kind of advice/how-to to provide me, that would be great.

[TimothyGu]

@Tiriel There are nothing in doc/ that is automatically generated; directly editing the markdown files is enough.

[Tiriel]

@TimothyGu Awesome, thanks!