Bug #17612 Updated: print_r, var_dump - disable direct output

ID: 17612 Updated by: postings.php.net@hans-spath.de Reported By: postings.php.net@hans-spath.de -Status: Feedback +Status: Open Bug Type: Feature/Change Request Operating System: All PHP Version: 4.2.1 New Comment: The output from print_r and var_export (and var_dump) differs. For example: I usually use var_dump because it shows me the datatype of the variable. Why should I renounce of some information because I want it as string and not as direct output? When I have something in my vars that should be escaped for HTML I'll get a messed up output because I can't do that: echo htmlentities(var_dump($html_debug,TRUE)); or echo htmlentities(print_r($html_debug,TRUE)); var_dump() sucks within HTML - even after a <pre>. Since PHP's output goes to an web browser in most cases, I should have the capability to produce HTML save debug informations. (And no, it's not a good idea to make the default output of var_dump HTML save, php-cli users would complain.) So please, update print_r and add a function that does the same as var_dump but returns a string. Previous Comments: ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2002-06-05 09:31:14] derick@php.net var_dump can not be modified, as you can use it to dump more than one variable. print_r can be modified, but I don't see any reason to do it as var_export() already works fine. Derick ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2002-06-05 09:27:38] postings.php.net@hans-spath.de Ok, but what about print_r and var_dump? I don't like to have three functions doing a similar job but expecting different parameters. Furthermore the documentation for var_export should be more clearly. IMO "You can also return the variable representation by using TRUE as second parameter to this function." says it returns just the content of the variable as var_dump($var,true) did some time ago (IIRC). ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2002-06-05 08:49:24] derick@php.net The second parameter to var_export makes the function return the information into a string, so this functionality is already implemented in someway. (also, IMO having it as an option is not an option :) Derick ------------------------------------------------------------------------ [2002-06-05 08:46:34] postings.php.net@hans-spath.de print_r, var_dump and var_export generate direct output. I don't like that, because when I dump a variable that contains HTML tags it messes up my output. I don't like to use some ob_* functions to get that output into a string before I can pass it through htmlentities because that's inperformant and looks ugly. I would like to have a function or a ini setting that controls the behavior of print_r, var_dump and var_export. There should be two modes: direct output and returning a string. I think that would be great to people who want to write debug informations into an external file, too. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ -- Edit this bug report at http://bugs.php.net/?id=17612&edit=1