Silverlight Logging Extension Method

Most of you will know that a Silverlight application runs in the Browser and Console.WriteLine() doesn’t work. During the development process you could use System.Diagnostics.Debug.WriteLine() to write messages to Visual Studio’s Output window. But what if an application is deployed and no Visual Studio is nearby and you just want simple Console output and not a logging framework like Clog, where a web service is involved? Or don’t want to use Visual Studio’s Output window?

The answer is simple if you are using Firefox with the Firebug add-on or Internet Explorer 8: Use the console.log mechanism and write your debug output to the Browser’s debug console.

Here's a simple extension method, which logs an object to the console.log:

public static void Log(this object obj)
{
   HtmlWindow window = HtmlPage.Window;
   var isConsoleAvailable = (bool)window.Eval("typeof(console) != 'undefined' && typeof(console.log) != 'undefined'");
   if (isConsoleAvailable)
   {
      var console = (window.Eval("console.log") as ScriptObject);
      if (console != null)
      {
         console.InvokeSelf(obj);
      }
   }
}

How to you use it:

"Hello Universe!".Log();
int a = 42;
a.Log();
String.Format("The answer to all questions is {0}.", a).Log();

And that's how the debug output looks within Firebug: