Phpstorm Xdebug Php

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Besides debugging the entire application, you can debug separate HTTP Requests. This is helpful when you are actually interested in a specific page that is accessed in a number of steps, but for this or that reason you cannot specify this page as the start page for debugging, for example, because you need to 'come' to this page with certain data.

  1. Php Docker Xdebug Phpstorm
  2. Phpstorm Xdebug Php Docker
  3. Php Docker Xdebug Phpstorm
  4. Phpstorm Xdebug Php-fpm
  5. Phpstorm Xdebug Hangs
  6. Configure Xdebug Phpstorm

To debug PHP HTTP requests in PhpStorm, you can use the following methods:

Make sure to check 'Use path mappings' and map php folder to '/var/www/myapp ' 5. Configure PHP remote debugger in PhpStorm: Run - Edit configurations - PHP Remote Debug. Add a new configuration and give it values like on the following screenshot. PHP 7.3 and later With PHP 7.3, the setting xdebug.remoteport has been deprecated, and the setting xdebug.clientport should be used instead. Also the default xdebug port changed from 9000 to 9003.

  • Compose and debug the request via the HTTP client in the code editor, which is the recommended approach.

  • Use the PHP HTTP Request run configuration. Based on the configuration settings, PhpStorm composes the request to run.

Prepare the debugging engine

  • Before you start debugging, make sure that you have a debugging engine installed and configured properly. PhpStorm supports debugging with two most popular tools: Xdebug and Zend Debugger. These tools cannot be used simultaneously because they block each other. To avoid this problem, you need to update the corresponding sections in the php.ini file as described in Configure Xdebug and Configure Zend Debugger.

    Open the active php.ini file in the editor:

    1. In the Settings/Preferences dialog Ctrl+Alt+S, click PHP.

    2. On the PHP page that opens, click next to the CLI Interpreter field.

    3. In the CLI Interpreters dialog that opens, the Configuration file read-only field shows the path to the active php.ini file. Click Open in Editor.

Set the breakpoints

Breakpoints are source code markers used to trigger actions during a debugging session. Typically, the purpose behind setting a breakpoint is to suspend program execution to allow you to examine program data. However, PhpStorm can use breakpoints as triggers for a variety of different actions. Breakpoints can be set at any time during the debugging process. Your breakpoints don't affect your source files directly, but the breakpoints and their settings are saved with your PhpStorm project so you can reuse them across debugging sessions.

  1. Place the caret at the desired line of the source code.

    Breakpoints can be set in the PHP context inside php, html, and files of other types. Line breakpoints can be set only on executable lines, but not on comments, declarations, or empty lines.

  2. Do one of the following:

    • Click the gutter area at a line where you want to toggle a breakpoint.

    • From the main menu, choose Run | Toggle Line Breakpoint.

    • Press Ctrl+F8.

Debug the request via the HTTP client in the code editor

Using the built-in HTTP Client, you can compose, execute, and debug HTTP requests directly from the PhpStorm code editor.

  1. Open an existing HTTP request file, or create a new one: in the File menu, point to New, and then click HTTP Request.

  2. Compose an HTTP request for the query that you need to debug.

  3. Position the caret at the request and press Alt+Enter or click in the editor gutter. From the popup menu, select PHP Debug <host>.

    If you have environments defined, select PHP Debug with ... and choose the environment in the popup menu. The selected environment will be used as the default one when executing or debugging the request later.

    PhpStorm will automatically add the XDEBUG_SESSION cookie to the request, execute it, and stop at the specified breakpoint.

When a request is executed, PhpStorm automatically creates a dedicated temporary HTTP Request run/debug configuration for it. You can save it as a permanent run/debug configuration if necessary.

Press Shift+F10 to run or Shift+F9 to debug the corresponding saved run/debug configuration at any moment without the need to open the request file in the editor. This can be useful if you are working on the web service endpoint implementation in a .php file and want to quickly test it by sending an HTTP request.

Create a debug configuration of the type PHP HTTP Request

PhpStorm comprises the settings specified in this configuration into a PHP HTTP request. Note that using HTTP Client in editor for debugging HTTP requests is a more convenient and recommended approach.

  1. Open the Run/Debug Configuration dialog by doing one of the following:

    • From the main menu, choose Run | Edit Configurations.

    • Press Alt+Shift+F10, then press 0 to display the Edit Configuration dialog or select the configuration from the popup and press F4.

  2. Click on the toolbar or press Insert. From the list, select the PHP HTTP Request configuration type. The PHP HTTP Request dialog opens.

  3. Specify the configuration name.

  4. In the Server list, specify the debug server configuration to interact with the Web server where the application is executed. Select one of the existing configurations or click Browse and define a debug server configuration in the Servers dialog that opens as described in Create a PHP debug server configuration.

  5. In the URL field, complete the host element of the request to debug. Type the path relative to the host specified in the debug server configuration. As you type, PhpStorm composes the URL address on-the-fly and displays it below the field.

  6. Specify whether you want to bring any data to the target page. From the Request method list, choose the relevant request type:

    • To access the page without bringing any data, choose GET.

    • To access the page with some data saved in variables, choose POST and type the relevant variables in the Request body field.

      By default, the Project Encoding is used in requests' encoding if it is not specified explicitly, for example:

      header('Content-type: text/html;charset=utf-8');

      The Project Encoding is specified on the File Encodings page of the Settings/Preferences dialog Ctrl+Alt+S.

  7. In the Query field, type the query string of the request. This string will be appended to the request after the ? symbol.

  8. Click OK, when ready.

Initiate a debugging session and examine the suspended program

  1. To start debugging, click the Debug button on the toolbar.

  2. As soon as the debugger suspends on reaching the first breakpoint, examine the application by analyzing frames. A frame corresponds to an active method or function call and stores the local variables of the called method or function, the arguments to it, and the code context that enables expression evaluation. All currently active frames are displayed on the Frames pane of the Debug tool window, where you can switch between them and analyze the information stored therein in the Variables and Watches panes. For more details, see the section Examining a Suspended Program.

  3. Continue running the program and examine its frames as soon as it is suspended again.

    • To control the program execution manually, step through the code using the commands under the Run menu or toolbar buttons: Step IntoF7, Step OutShift+F8, Step OverF8, and others. For more details, see Step through the program.

    • To have the program run automatically up to the next breakpoint, resume the session by choosing Run | Debugging Actions | Resume Program or pressing F9.

Created at 2020-10-10Updated at 2020-10-11Category Docker Tag Resource / Docker / PHP / PhpStorm / PhpUnit / Linux

I have recently configured my windows 10 laptop with an additional SSD, so I could experiment with Linux. I have already installed Pop!_OS Git, PhpStorm and Docker. I haven’t installed PHP or Composer locally. Next I want to learn how to use this new environment. This is what I have found out so far.

Start with a Project

One of my favorite projects is the Gilded Rose Kata. I can clone that from github as follows:

Create docker-compose.yml

It is possible to run PHP cli without a docker-compose file, I have found it is easier to set up PhpStorm using this intermediate step.

PhpStorm has several preconfigured Docker containers, source:

They can be used as follows:

Php 7.3 CLI and XDebug 2.7

docker-compose.yml

The above will work for Linux, for Windows and MacOS the XDEBUG_CONFIG: will need the changed as follows:

Windows and MacOS

Windows and MacOS replace with XDEBUG_CONFIG:host.docker.internal, which will automatically resolve to the internal address of the host Docker is running on.

MacOS with local Homebrew php-fpm

If you use a local Homebrew php-fpm installation, port 9000 (which is the default debugging port) may become occupied. PhpStorm will remain silent on starting listening for incoming connections. If this is the case, in the Settings | Languages & Frameworks | PHP | Debug, set the Debug port to 9001, and use the following configuration line instead.

Apache, PHP 7.3, XDebug 2.7 and MySQL

For information this is the LAMP version (based on the phpstorm-workshop).

docker-compose.yml

Phpstorm xdebug php docker

Install dependencies using composer

To keep things simple the composer Docker container can be used to install the dependencies.

This is the script recommended on the docker hub composer page to avoid filesystem permissions problems

By default, Composer runs as root inside the container. This can lead to permission issues on your host filesystem. You can work around this by running the container with a different user:

On windows change $PWD for the full path to the project (note: forward slash / as separator), remove the line end and run the command as one line:

Alternatively, more complex projects will need specific PHP extensions to be installed, which are not included in the Composer Docker container. The following method could be used to install Composer, inside the container and install the dependencies.

Php Docker Xdebug Phpstorm

  1. Access bash in the php-cli container: docker-compose run --rm php-cli /bin/bash
  2. Install Composer, by following the download instructions for Linux
  3. Still, inside the container, install dependencies: php composer.phar install
  4. Exit the container exit

Note: In Linux, using the second method Composer will create the vendor folder as root!

The permissions can be changed using chown:

Further information

Phpstorm Xdebug Php Docker

There is a detailed description about running Docker containers as current host user.

The official documentation on Docker run and docker-compose cli reference.

Configure PhpStorm

Now the project has been cloned from GitHub and the dependencies have been installed. PhpStorm can be setup to use Docker. Thanks to Gary Hockin’s excellent YouTube video Running PHPUnit Tests in PhpStorm with Docker, the setup process can be easily replicated.

There is a four stage process:

  1. Configure PhpStorm to use Docker
  2. Configure the remote interpreter
  3. Configure PhpUnit
  4. Create Test runner

1. Configure PhpStorm to use Docker

  • Settings (Ctrl + Alt + S)
  • Search for Docker
    • Under Build, Execution, Deployment
  • Click + to add
  • Select Unix socket
    • Confirm connection was successful

2. Configure the default CLI interpreter

  • Settings (Ctrl + Alt + S)
  • Search for CLI interpreter
    • Under Language & Frameworks > PHP
  • Click the ellipse button next to CLI Interpreter
  • Click +
  • Select From Docker, Vagrant…
  • Choose Docker Compose
  • Choose the Service from the drop down list (e.g. php-cli)
  • Select OK
  • Change the name e.g. Docker PHP
  • Apply and OK
  • Check the mapping
    • e.g. for a web project <Project root>→/var/www/html
    • e.g. for an app project <Project root>→/app

3. Configure PhpUnit

  • Settings (Ctrl + Alt + S)
  • Search for Test Frameworks
    • Under Language & Frameworks > PHP
  • Click +
  • Select PhpUnit from remote interpreter
  • Choose the interpreter created above, e.g. Docker PHP
    • Confirm the path mappings, as above <Project root>→/app
    • Input the script path based on the mapping inside the container e.g. /app/vendor/autoload.php
    • Under Test runner, tick Default configuration script, type in the path, in the docker container. e.g. /app/phpunit.xml

Php Docker Xdebug Phpstorm

4. Create the test runner

  • Click Edit Configuration (next to run test button)
  • Click + to add
  • Select PHPUnit
  • Under Test Runner choose Defined in the configuration file
  • Name - e.g. Docker PHPUnit

Phpstorm Xdebug Php-fpm

  • Click Play to run all the tests!

What about configuring xDebug?

Thanks to this setup, xDebug has been automatically configured! It will use the default PHP Interpreter, which was configured in step 2. A breakpoint can be set in the app or tests can be run with coverage :)

Phpstorm Xdebug Hangs

Enjoy the kata!

Configure Xdebug Phpstorm

Edit: Added details on running commands on MacOS and Windows and small tweaks.