The best debugging strategies for vibe coding outputs combine normal software engineering practices with prompt-driven iteration. Start by treating generated code as you would a junior developer’s patch: isolate the change, reproduce the issue, and write or extend tests that expose the bug clearly. Make failing tests your first line of defense—unit tests for pure logic, integration tests for IO-heavy paths, and smoke tests for critical endpoints. Once you have a red test, you can iterate with the model, pasting the failing test and error message, and asking it to fix only the minimal part of the code. This keeps the debugging loop controlled instead of rewriting whole files blindly.
Next, lean heavily on structured logging and assertions. Ask the model to add explicit logging of inputs, outputs, and key intermediate values along the hot path. For example, if you’re debugging a vector-search API, log the query text, embedding dimensions, search parameters, and the IDs returned from a system like Milvus or Zilliz Cloud. Combine this with simple runtime checks: assert that vector dimensions match the collection schema, that required fields are present, and that timeouts are handled correctly. You can then take the logs from a failing request, feed the relevant snippet back into the model, and ask, “Explain why this sequence of inputs produced that output.”
Finally, don’t forget classic tools: static analysis, type checking, and stepping through the code in a debugger. Vibe coding doesn’t change the fact that mypy, ESLint, or your language’s compiler can catch many issues early. It’s often helpful to have the model fix specific lint or type errors by pasting diagnostics directly into your prompt. For tricky logic (e.g., scoring functions for ranking Milvus results), single-step through the function with a small, well-understood input and compare actual vs. expected behavior. Over time, your strategy becomes a cycle: write tests, capture context, ask the model for a focused fix, and re-run the test suite until everything passes.