How to identify at runtime if the swf is in debug or release mode/build

It may be interesting to know at runtime whether an application is running from a debug or release SWF file. It allows the application to automatically execute debug specific code when the file is a debug SWF file and ignore this code when it is published as a release file. Also, it should be nice to know if you have a debug flash player just for the same reasons. But for the last one, there is a function in the Capabilities class called isDebugger.

One solution would be to use conditional compilation. The other solution is in the following code (hack).

package org.adm.runtime
{
	import flash.system.Capabilities;
 
	public class ModeCheck
	{
		/**
		 * Returns true if the user is running the app on a Debug Flash Player.
		 * Uses the Capabilities class
		 **/
		public static function isDebugPlayer() : Boolean
		{
			return Capabilities.isDebugger;
		}
 
		/**
		 * Returns true if the swf is built in debug mode
		 **/
		public static function isDebugBuild() : Boolean
		{
                        var st:String = new Error().getStackTrace();
			return (st && st.search(/:[0-9]+]$/m) > -1);
		}
 
		/**
		 * Returns true if the swf is built in release mode
		 **/
		public static function isReleaseBuild() : Boolean
		{
			return !isDebugBuild();
		}
	}
}

This code simply searches for line numbers of errors in StackTrace result. Only StackTrace result of a debug SWF file contains line numbers. Then we know that we are running a debug or release SWF file.

This class is also available in the Components Pack at Runtime subpackage