Bug A script is having trouble reading another

I`ve been setting up a character list thingie.
In a UI Canvas, I have a button that runs GenerateRandomCharacter() in this:

public class CharacterData

{

    public string foo;

}



public class PlayerData : MonoBehaviour

{

    public List<CharacterData> playerCharactersData = new List<CharacterData>();



    public void GenerateRandomCharacter()

    {

        CharacterData generatedCharacter = new CharacterData();

        generatedCharacter.foo = "bar"

        playerCharactersData.Add(generatedCharacter);

    }

}

In another script attached to , i have:

public class UIManager : MonoBehaviour

{

    [SerializeField] GameObject characterTab;

    PlayerData playerData;



    public void GenerateTabs()

    {

        playerData = gameObject.GetComponent<PlayerData>();

        int characterCount = playerData.playerCharactersData.Count;



        for (int i = 0;i < characterCount; i++) { 

            CharacterData data = playerData.playerCharactersData[i];



            GameObject tab = Instantiate(characterTab);

        }

    }

}

Everything is working the way it should, except that the characterCount isn't being updated.

ChatGPT couldn't help me, and I feel like I'm missing something really stupid.

 

Yes... debugging! It is time to start debugging!

Here is how you can begin your exciting new debugging adventures:

You must find a way to get the information you need in order to reason about what the problem is.

Once you understand what the problem is, you may begin to reason about a solution to the problem.

What is often happening in these cases is one of the following:

- the code you think is executing is not actually executing at all
- the code is executing far EARLIER or LATER than you think
- the code is executing far LESS OFTEN than you think
- the code is executing far MORE OFTEN than you think
- the code is executing on another GameObject than you think it is
- you're getting an error or warning and you haven't noticed it in the console window

To help gain more insight into your problem, I recommend liberally sprinkling

Debug.Log()

statements through your code to display information in realtime.

Doing this should help you answer these types of questions:

- is this code even running? which parts are running? how often does it run? what order does it run in?
- what are the names of the GameObjects or Components involved?
- what are the values of the variables involved? Are they initialized? Are the values reasonable?
- are you meeting ALL the requirements to receive callbacks such as triggers / colliders (review the documentation)

Knowing this information will help you reason about the behavior you are seeing.

You can also supply a second argument to Debug.Log() and when you click the message, it will highlight the object in scene, such as

Debug.Log("Problem!",this);

If your problem would benefit from in-scene or in-game visualization, Debug.DrawRay() or Debug.DrawLine() can help you visualize things like rays (used in raycasting) or distances.

You can also call Debug.Break() to pause the Editor when certain interesting pieces of code run, and then study the scene manually, looking for all the parts, where they are, what scripts are on them, etc.

You can also call GameObject.CreatePrimitive() to emplace debug-marker-ish objects in the scene at runtime.

You could also just display various important quantities in UI Text elements to watch them change as you play the game.

If you are running a mobile device you can also view the console output. Google for how on your particular mobile target, such as this answer or iOS: https://forum.unity.com/threads/how-to-capturing-device-logs-on-ios.529920/ or this answer for Android: https://forum.unity.com/threads/how-to-capturing-device-logs-on-android.528680/

If you are working in VR, it might be useful to make your on onscreen log output, or integrate one from the asset store, so you can see what is happening as you operate your software.

Another useful approach is to temporarily strip out everything besides what is necessary to prove your issue. This can simplify and isolate compounding effects of other items in your scene or prefab.

Here's an example of putting in a laser-focused Debug.Log() and how that can save you a TON of time wallowing around speculating what might be going wrong:

https://forum.unity.com/threads/coroutine-missing-hint-and-error.1103197/#post-7100494

When in doubt, print it out!(tm)

Note: the

print()

function is an alias for Debug.Log() provided by the MonoBehaviour class.

Once you find out what your code is actually doing, if you are still unable to reason about how to fix it, here is how to report your problem productively in the Unity3D forums:

http://plbm.com/?p=220

This is the bare minimum of information to report:

- what you want
- what you tried
- what you expected to happen
- what actually happened, especially any errors you see
- links to documentation you used to cross-check your work (CRITICAL!!!)

You may edit your post above.

If you post a code snippet, ALWAYS USE CODE TAGS:

How to use code tags: https://forum.unity.com/threads/using-code-tags-properly.143875/

 

please use code tags when posting code. I dont believe enough information is available in the code you provided to definitively answer the question. but here's my line of thought for fixing it.

Q: Why should 'characterCount' increase?
A: because my UIManager INSTANCE has a reference to an INSTANCE of PlayerData and characterCount is just the size of that PlayerData INSTANCE's list, and an element is added to that list when THAT PlayerData INSTANCE's Generate() function is called.

Maybe the Generate() function isn't actually getting called?
maybe Generate() is being called on a different instance of PlayerData, so it's list grows, but the list being used to calculate characterCount is not?
maybe there are various instances of UIManager and each of those has its own playerData that it references?

 

Just in case you don't have access to GPT-4 (it's currently locked behind a subscription) I've posted it's response below, and between examining your code and reading it's response I feel like it's the most likely culprit.

 

I would usually do it like this.

Code (CSharp):

1.  PlayerData playerData = gameObject.GetComponent<PlayerData>();

Or send it this way....

Code (CSharp):

1. public void GenerateRandomCharacter()
2.  
3. {
4.  
5. GenerateTabs(playerCharacterData);
6.  
7. }
8.  
9.  
10. public void GenerateTabs(List<CharacterData> playerCharacterData)
11. {
12.   //get the list count
13. }