Hello all I would like to share an idea regarding improving debug information for ZEND_ASSERT and exceptions.
Why has this become relevant to me? At this stage of development, asynchronous core code tends to expose hidden bugs that are not detected in the usual way. I am considering adding a telemetry service to PHP with the ability to collect information, since in such cases logging is the only reliable solution. But this post is not about that. ## The idea When a regular PHP exception or ASSERT is triggered, output two backtraces: one for PHP and one for C. To avoid breaking existing tests, this output could be optionally suppressed via `php.ini`. To achieve this, https://github.com/ianlancetaylor/libbacktrace is used — almost an industry standard! ## How it looks: ```text edmond@Edmond:~/php-src$ ./sapi/cli/php -d zend.exception_c_backtrace=1 -r 'throw new RuntimeException("test");' >>> RuntimeException at /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_exceptions.c:178 --- C backtrace --- #0 zend_throw_exception_internal /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_exceptions.c:178 #1 zend_throw_exception_object /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_exceptions.c:1043 #2 ZEND_THROW_SPEC_TMP_HANDLER /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_vm_execute.h:17281 #3 execute_ex /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_vm_execute.h:112392 #4 zend_execute /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_vm_execute.h:115483 #5 zend_eval_stringl /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_execute_API.c:1491 #6 zend_eval_stringl_ex /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_execute_API.c:1533 #7 zend_eval_string_ex /home/edmond/php-src/Zend/zend_execute_API.c:1543 #8 do_cli /home/edmond/php-src/sapi/cli/php_cli.c:988 #9 main /home/edmond/php-src/sapi/cli/php_cli.c:1369 #10 __libc_start_call_main ../sysdeps/nptl/libc_start_call_main.h:58 #11 __libc_start_main_impl ../csu/libc-start.c:360 #12 0x55c9f5e0b444 ??:0 #13 0xffffffffffffffff ??:0 --- PHP backtrace --- #0 Command line code:1 {main}() Fatal error: Uncaught RuntimeException: test in Command line code:1 Stack trace: #0 {main} thrown in Command line code on line 1 For Windows, a different library will be required. Maybe someone has ideas? Thanks
