How to create "Verbose mode" (Enable/disable trace output)?

Question

Hi there! I'd like to do as Papervision:
// Block Papervison3D trace output
Papervision3D.VERBOSE = false;
that is, a global variable for enabling/disabling the trace outputs of my own program. I come up with creating
a class and putting a static boolean member variable. But there is something I'm not sure about: How to use
it...
For example: every time I need to do a trace, would I have to put this ? -->
if( MyClass.VERBOSE ) trace("whatever");
So it isn't needed to instance the object because a static variable is used. That's the way, isn't it?
Thanks and regads.

Answer 1

From the book I'm reading, the author uses it the same way you're saying:
Inside your Classes, you have
private var _verbose:Boolean = false;
I noticed he uses it always (or almost) in the constructor of the classes:
public function whatever (var:*, verbose:Boolean);
//I tend to use verbose:Boolean = false on the constructor too so you don't have to always set it.
inside the constructor you have:
_verbose = verbose;
and normaly inside methods handling events like Event.OPEN, Event.INIT, IOErrorEvent.IO_ERROR, HTTPStatusEvent.HTTP_STATUS, you have something like this:
private function onOpen (e:Event):void {
     if (_verbose) {
          trace("The loading process has begun, or whatever");