This is a bit of code we use to manage inline debugging code.
We use a global variable "::DEBUG" to set the debugging state,
when ::DEBUG < 0, the code runs "flat out" regardless of the
arguments sent to debugPuts.

The procedure addLogEntry is not provided here.  It is a very
elaborate set of procs which provide custom trace information
for our system -- replace it with your own handler.

 ## ******************************************************** 
 ##
 ## Name: debugPuts
 ##
 ## Description:
 ## Used to make optional puts's and addLogEntry's based on
 ## debugging level. setting ::DEBUG > 1 turns on putsing to
 ## stderr.
 ## An optional special handler may be specified as a third
 ## command line argument.
 ##
 ## Parameters:
 ## msg     - text to be displayed/logged
 ## level   - optional level modifier
 ## handler - optional special handler 
 ##           (not the default addLogEntry)
 ## Usage:
 ##
 ## Comments:
 ## Convenience routine for making debugging switchable.
 ## returns in 25 microseconds if ::DEBUG < 0.
 ## If ::DEBUG < 0 then the debug level cannot be
 ## used to cause debugging output.

 proc debugPuts { { msg "" } { level 0 } { handler "" } } {
     if { $::DEBUG < 0 } { return {} }
     ;## get global debug level if none is provided
     if { ! $level } { set level $::DEBUG }
     ;## if debugging is on...
     if { $level } {
        if { [ regexp {^$} $handler ] } {
           set handler "addLogEntry"
           }
        if { [ string length $msg ] } {
           if { [ catch { uplevel $handler [ list $msg ] } err ] } {
              addLogEntry "debugPuts:$handler: $err (message was: $msg)"
              }
           if { $level > 1 } {
              puts stderr $msg
              }
           }
        }   
     return {}
 }
 ## ******************************************************** 
 ;## PSE