How do I enable error reporting in PHP?

Enabling error reporting in PHP is essential for debugging and identifying issues in your code. Here’s a step-by-step guide to enable it:

1. Modify php.ini Configuration

Locate and edit the php.ini file (your PHP configuration file). Ensure the following settings are enabled:

iniCopy codedisplay_errors = On
error_reporting = E_ALL

This tells PHP to display all errors and warnings.

2. Use ini_set() in Code

If you can’t modify php.ini, you can enable error reporting directly in your script by adding:

phpCopy codeini_set('display_errors', 1);
error_reporting(E_ALL);

3. Check Environment

For production environments, it’s a good practice to log errors instead of displaying them. You can log errors by setting:

iniCopy codelog_errors = On
error_log = /path/to/error.log
display_errors = Off

This ensures that errors are logged and not visible to users, enhancing security.

4. Error Reporting for Specific Errors

You can also customize error reporting to only log specific types of errors. For instance:

phpCopy codeerror_reporting(E_ERROR | E_WARNING | E_PARSE);

This will display errors, warnings, and parse errors, excluding notices.

Conclusion

Enabling PHP error reporting helps you identify and fix issues early in development. For development environments, display errors for instant feedback, and for production environments, log errors for later review.