How to avoid typing <pre> when viewing arrays... any ideas?

Question

I often have the need to view data in arrays and use the html tag <pre> to do this. However, it becomes tedious and frustrating having to type the same thing out all the time.

My question, what is your technique for avoiding this annoyance of programming with PHP?

Answer 1

There is no way to view it nicely formatted format except for using <pre> tag. Alternatively you can create this function and use that instead:

function pretty_print(array $array){
  echo '<pre>';
  print_r($array);
  echo '</pre>';
}

Now instead of print_r, you can use the pretty_print. No need to type <pre> every now and then :)

Answer 2

You could try something like this. Note it is untested.

function html_var_dump($obj)
{
   ob_start();
   var_dump($obj);
   $output = htmlentities(ob_get_contents());
   ob_end_clean();
   echo "<pre>$output</pre>";
}

You can use print_r instead of var_dump if you prefer.

Answer 3

Funny you should ask that, I just wrote a short function to save me the pain of having to do this so much.

function pre($option = "open"){                   
  if (is_object($option) || is_array($option)):
    print "<pre>";
    print_r($option);
    print "</pre>";
  else:
    $option=="open"?print "<pre>": print "</pre>";
  endif;
}    

If you pass an array or an object to it, it will print it inside pre tags. If you just want an opening tag, then do not pass an argument. If you want a closing tag, pass it any other argument (e.g. 1)

e.g.:

pre($result); //prints in pre tags

pre(); //just prints <pre>
print "hello";
pre(1); //just prints </pre>

Answer 4

Install XDebug. Besides making print_r and var_dump a lot prettier (and more useful), it also has other very handy features.

Answer 5

I use this

function d($obj)
{
   ob_start();
   print_r($obj);
   $output = htmlspecialchars(ob_get_clean());
   echo "<pre>$output</pre>";
}

Answer 6

function pre_($array)
{
  echo '<pre>' . print_r( $array, true ) . '</pre>';
}

Answer 7

I change the default_mimetype (default text/html) php.ini setting to text/plain.

Answer 8

One of my favorite tricks, if printing the array is all I'm doing:

header('Content-type: text/plain');
print_r($arr);