Definition
Plain language
A marker a programmer sets to pause a running program at a chosen line so they can look at what's happening.
As stated in the literature
A debugger directive that halts execution at a specified location or on a condition so program state can be inspected; agent debuggers like DAIRA set conditional function-level breakpoints to capture full frame traces.
Also called: breakpoints
Why it matters: Without breakpoints, finding why a program misbehaves means guessing instead of watching it run step by step.
For example, a programmer chasing a bug might set a breakpoint at the line that computes a price, so the program pauses there and they can check the values feeding into it.
Heard on the show
“It opens up Python's debugger — PDB — sets a breakpoint, and starts stepping through the code line by line.”Episode 005 — Why a Debugger Designed for Humans Is the Wrong Tool for an AI Agent