Debugging with Xdebug
One of the most useful tools in software development is a proper debugger. It allows you to trace the execution of your code and monitor the contents of the stack. Xdebug, PHP’s debugger, can be utilized by various IDEs to provide Breakpoints and stack inspection. It can also allow tools to perform code coverage analysis and code profiling.
If you find yourself in a bind, willing to resort to var_dump()/print_r(), and you still can’t find the solution - maybe you need to use the debugger.
Install Xdebug
Graphical debuggers make it very easy to step through code, inspect variables, and eval code against the live runtime. Many IDE’s have built-in or plugin-based support for graphical debugging with Xdebug.