Is there a pretty print for PHP?

Answer 1

How about a single standalone function named as debug from https://github.com/hazardland/debug.php.

Typical debug() html output looks like this:

But you can output data as a plain text with same function also (with 4 space indented tabs) like this (and even log it in file if needed):

string : "Test string"
boolean : true
integer : 17
float : 9.99
array (array)
    bob : "alice"
    1 : 5
    2 : 1.4
object (test2)
    another (test3)
        string1 : "3d level"
        string2 : "123"
        complicated (test4)
            enough : "Level 4"

Answer 2

In PHP 5.4 you can use JSON_PRETTY_PRINT if you are using the function json_encode.

json_encode(array('one', 'two', 'three'), JSON_PRETTY_PRINT);

http://php.net/manual/en/function.json-encode.php

Answer 3

This is a little function I use all the time its handy if you are debugging arrays. The title parameter gives you some debug info as what array you are printing. it also checks if you have supplied it with a valid array and lets you know if you didn't.

function print_array($title,$array){

        if(is_array($array)){

            echo $title."<br/>".
            "||---------------------------------||<br/>".
            "<pre>";
            print_r($array); 
            echo "</pre>".
            "END ".$title."<br/>".
            "||---------------------------------||<br/>";

        }else{
             echo $title." is not an array.";
        }
}

Basic usage:

//your array
$array = array('cat','dog','bird','mouse','fish','gerbil');
//usage
print_array("PETS", $array);

Results:

PETS
||---------------------------------||

Array
(
    [0] => cat
    [1] => dog
    [2] => bird
    [3] => mouse
    [4] => fish
    [5] => gerbil
)

END PETS
||---------------------------------||

Answer 4

If you're doing more debugging, Xdebug is essential. By default it overrides var_dump() with it's own version which displays a lot more information than PHP's default var_dump().

There's also Zend_Debug.

Answer 5

I pulled a few of these options together into a wee little helper function at

http://github.com/perchten/neat_html/

You can print to html, neatly outputted, as well as jsonify the string, auto-print or return etc.

It handles file includes, objects, arrays, nulls vs false and the like.

There's also some globally accessible (but well scoped) helpers for when using settings in a more environment-like way

Plus dynamic, array-based or string optional arguments.

And, I keep adding to it. So it's supported :D

Answer 6

This is what I use to print my arrays:

<pre>
    <?php
        print_r($your_array);
    ?>
</pre>

The magic comes with the pre tag.