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I have just started using Eclipse CDT and would like to know why there are two run configurations such as Debug and Release.

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Could I use this this to improve my workflow in any way? The manuals for CDT just mention that there are two default configurations, but never mention why.

Thank you for your answers.

SDG
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    Monodevelop and visual studio have this as well; debug typically has no code optimization, allowing you debug through every line, log info for testing, etc while release is optimized as a release build with full compiler optimization. With that said, its worth unit testing the release build because thats the code that likely makes it to the finished product – D. Ben Knoble Oct 13 '15 at 01:44

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Not specifically to Eclipse, but for all software and web development you'll encounter these two configurations.

You use Debug to test your application. You will probably generate debug symbols to step through your code, and it will probably avoid some optimizations. The purpose is to facilitate diagnosing issues.

Then, Release configuration is the one you want to use to publish or deploy your application. It could apply optimizations.

Also, if you make want to connect to different servers, or name files differently, or even execute different path codes depending if you are testing locally or if the final user is executing what you made. Another example is Logging and Tracing, in Debug mode you may want to enable things to print to console or write to a file/log. But in Release you'll want to avoid them if it reduces the performance

Alfredo MS
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