Tracing php application with xdebug

The simplest method of debugging code in php is the echo function. But sometimes we cannot use it - for example ajax calls and etc. The function traces of xdebug is the good method of showing variables and function calls. The latest xamp packages include Xdebug too. To activate it we need only to uncomment line zend_extension = "C:\xampp\php\ext\php_xdebug.dll". After that, we must set xdebug.collect_params = 3 in xdebug section of php.ini. This setting give us the opportunity to show argument values in the function calls. Then we can put xdebug_start_trace in any places of our code:

//some function
	xdebug_start_trace('c:/data/2');
		//... some program code
		xdebug_var_dump($some_var);
	xdebug_stop_trace(); 
//another function		
	 xdebug_start_trace('c:/data/3');
	 //... some program code
		xdebug_var_dump($another_var);
	xdebug_stop_trace();