PHP Profiling & Debugging Tools

🐞 PHP Profiling & Debugging Tools – Improve Performance

Debugging and profiling are essential for finding and fixing errors in PHP code. Let’s explore the best tools to debug, profile, and optimize your PHP applications! 🚀

📌 Debugging in PHP

PHP provides built-in functions to help track errors and debug code efficiently.

📝 1. Using error_reporting()

Enable all errors and warnings to catch potential issues.

<?php
error_reporting(E_ALL);
ini_set("display_errors", 1);

echo $undefinedVariable; // Will show a notice
?>

🔍 2. Debugging with var_dump() & print_r()

Use these functions to inspect variables.

<?php
$data = array("name" => "John", "age" => 30);

// Print detailed variable info
var_dump($data);
print_r($data);
?>

🚀 3. Using Xdebug for Advanced Debugging

Xdebug is a powerful PHP extension that provides stack traces, breakpoints, and profiling.

📝 Install Xdebug

Run this command in the terminal:

pecl install xdebug

Enable it in your php.ini file:

zend_extension=xdebug
xdebug.mode=debug

🛠️ Features of Xdebug:

• ✅ Shows detailed stack traces.
• ✅ Supports step debugging (breakpoints in VS Code & PhpStorm).
• ✅ Provides performance profiling.

⚡ 4. Profiling with Blackfire

Blackfire is a PHP profiling tool that helps optimize performance.

📝 Install Blackfire

Run the following command:

curl -sL https://packages.blackfire.io/install.sh | bash

🎯 Why Use Blackfire?

• ✅ Helps analyze slow PHP scripts.
• ✅ Provides call graphs & memory usage insights.
• ✅ Works well with Laravel, Symfony, WordPress, etc.

🔹 5. Logging Errors with error_log()

Store errors in a log file instead of displaying them.

<?php
$message = "An error occurred!";
error_log($message, 3, "errors.log");
?>

🎯 Summary

• ✅ Use error_reporting() to enable error display.
• ✅ Use var_dump() and print_r() for debugging.
• ✅ Install Xdebug for advanced debugging & profiling.
• ✅ Use Blackfire to analyze performance issues.
• ✅ Log errors using error_log() instead of displaying them.

🚀 Next Steps

Start using these debugging tools to catch bugs faster and optimize performance! 🛠️