macOS Debugging and Troubleshooting

This feature is in preview release and is subject to change.

Open 3D Engine (O3DE), the successor to Lumberyard, is now available in Developer Preview. Download O3DE or visit the AWS Game Tech blog to learn more.

Lumberyard provides full access to the source code, which allows you to debug your macOS application using Xcode without additional Lumberyard-specific steps to follow. For information about debugging and profiling your macOS application, see Debugging in the official Apple developer documentation.

Unable to see activity in the shader compiler window

You must connect to the shader compiler on your PC in order to compile the subset of shaders required by your game, on demand. To verify that your app has connected correctly and obtained all shaders, you can view the output in the shader compiler window. If you still do not see any activity in the window, please check your setup by following the instructions on the Building Shaders for macOS Games page.

Cleaning the project does not create a full rebuild of the macOS application

Lumberyard uses a custom build step to generate the final executable and temporary C++ object files, which output to the \BinTemp\darwin_x64_debug or \BinTemp\darwin_x64_profile directory where you installed Lumberyard. Unlike a regular Xcode project, in order to create a full rebuild of the macOS application, you must manually delete the contents of the output folder or run one of the following Waf commands from a Terminal window:

• To build debug, run the following command: lmbr_waf.sh clean_darwin_x64_debug

• To build profile, run the following command: lmbr_waf.sh clean_darwin_x64_profile

• To build release, run the following command: lmbr_waf.sh clean_darwin_x64_release

Observed frame rate varies greatly

While running your application, the observable frame rate can vary depending on the build (debug or profile) you are running and whether you are connected to the Xcode debugger. To display the frame rate in the upper right corner of the screen, set the r_DisplayInfo configuration variable to 1 or higher. When your Xcode project is generated, the default build scheme is set up for debugging. If you want to test or profile your application's speed, we recommend that you edit your active scheme to run a profile build. Deselect Debug executable.