I am struggling to debug PHPUnit Tests (with xdebug) in a custom D8 Module from PHPStorm or via the command line. Is it possible to do this?

Here’s what I have tried

Command Line

I can run my tests from within an ssh session on the VM with the following command:

$ php core/scripts/run-tests.sh --url http://data.vm --color --verbose --module data_logger

I have tried to initiate the debug session from the command line with the following:

$ export XDEBUG_CONFIG="idekey=PHPSTORM remote_enable=1 remote_connect_back=0 remote_mode=req remote_port=9000"; sudo php core/scripts/run-tests.sh --url http://data.vm --color --verbose --module data_logger

$ sudo php -dxdebug.remote_enable=1 -dxdebug.remote_mode=req -dxdebug.remote_port=9000 -dxdebug.remote_host=192.168.88.1 -dxdebug.remote_connect_back=0 core/scripts/run-tests.sh --url http://data.vm --color --verbose --module data_logger

Note, I don’t think I should have to specify any of the xdebug variables on the command line because they are already set, but I was grasping at straws…

The tests execute, but the debugger session never seems to start within PHPStorm.

PHP Storm

PHPStorm Miserably Fails running my custom module PHPUnit Test.

PHPStorm SUCCEEDS running and debugging the Bolt included PHPUnit tests in the tests/phpunit folder.

After setting the PHPUnit settings screen to use a remote interpreter and specifying a custom autoloader to the root vendor folder /var/www/data/vendor/autoload.php

I right click and choose run/debug on one of the files, and everything works as expected. The debugger starts and we’re good to go.

The command that is displayed in the console is:

sftp://vagrant@192.168.88.88:22/usr/bin/php -dxdebug.remote_enable=1 -dxdebug.remote_mode=req -dxdebug.remote_port=9000 -dxdebug.remote_host=192.168.88.1 /home/vagrant/.phpstorm_helpers/phpunit.php --no-configuration Drupal\\Tests\\PHPUnit\\BuildTest /var/www/data/tests/phpunit/BuildTest.php

The main difference that I see is that these tests extent TestBase where as my Test extends WebTestBase and the PHPUnit tests at the root level include a phpunit.xml file which I have tried to copy and update to point to the vendor/autoload.php as well but this didn’t have any effect.

What I’m confused about is why PHPStorm seems to inherently understand that the tests/phpunit/* are PHPUnit tests when I right click on those files but when I right click on my Test class file, I get the option to debug with Javascript or as a PHP Script. Why does PHPStorm not recognize my test class as a PHPUnit test?

Bottom line, how can I debug a custom module test in PHPStorm?

Additional Context:

I’m running an Acquia Bolt generated site on a Drupal-VM Virtual Machine running PHP7 w/ XDebug Enabled. The site is using composer.json as the dependency manager for drupal core as well as all contrib modules. This is just a project for me to test some things, so here’s the github repo.

I can verify that xdebug is running on the VM as expected:

$ php -i | grep xdebug
/etc/php5/cli/conf.d/20-xdebug.ini,
xdebug
xdebug support => enabled
xdebug.auto_trace => Off => Off
xdebug.cli_color => 0 => 0
xdebug.collect_assignments => Off => Off
xdebug.collect_includes => On => On
xdebug.collect_params => 0 => 0
xdebug.collect_return => Off => Off
xdebug.collect_vars => Off => Off
xdebug.coverage_enable => On => On
xdebug.default_enable => On => On
xdebug.dump.COOKIE => no value => no value
xdebug.dump.ENV => no value => no value
xdebug.dump.FILES => no value => no value
xdebug.dump.GET => no value => no value
xdebug.dump.POST => no value => no value
xdebug.dump.REQUEST => no value => no value
xdebug.dump.SERVER => no value => no value
xdebug.dump.SESSION => no value => no value
xdebug.dump_globals => On => On
xdebug.dump_once => On => On
xdebug.dump_undefined => Off => Off
xdebug.extended_info => On => On
xdebug.file_link_format => no value => no value
xdebug.force_display_errors => Off => Off
xdebug.force_error_reporting => 0 => 0
xdebug.halt_level => 0 => 0
xdebug.idekey => PHPSTORM => PHPSTORM
xdebug.max_nesting_level => 256 => 256
xdebug.max_stack_frames => -1 => -1
xdebug.overload_var_dump => On => On
xdebug.profiler_aggregate => Off => Off
xdebug.profiler_append => Off => Off
xdebug.profiler_enable => Off => Off
xdebug.profiler_enable_trigger => Off => Off
xdebug.profiler_enable_trigger_value => no value => no value
xdebug.profiler_output_dir => /tmp => /tmp
xdebug.profiler_output_name => cachegrind.out.%p => cachegrind.out.%p
xdebug.remote_addr_header => no value => no value
xdebug.remote_autostart => Off => Off
xdebug.remote_connect_back => On => On
xdebug.remote_cookie_expire_time => 3600 => 3600
xdebug.remote_enable => On => On
xdebug.remote_handler => dbgp => dbgp
xdebug.remote_host => localhost => localhost
xdebug.remote_log => /tmp/xdebug.log => /tmp/xdebug.log
xdebug.remote_mode => req => req
xdebug.remote_port => 9000 => 9000
xdebug.scream => Off => Off
xdebug.show_error_trace => Off => Off
xdebug.show_exception_trace => Off => Off
xdebug.show_local_vars => Off => Off
xdebug.show_mem_delta => Off => Off
xdebug.trace_enable_trigger => Off => Off
xdebug.trace_enable_trigger_value => no value => no value
xdebug.trace_format => 0 => 0
xdebug.trace_options => 0 => 0
xdebug.trace_output_dir => /tmp => /tmp
xdebug.trace_output_name => trace.%c => trace.%c
xdebug.var_display_max_children => 128 => 128
xdebug.var_display_max_data => 512 => 512
xdebug.var_display_max_depth => 3 => 3

I can verify that my test displays and runs as expected at admin/config/development/testing.

Note: I can pause the test if I initiate the test through Drupal at /admin/config/development/testing. This is not an ideal workflow as it’s slow and I’d rather not switch out of the IDE. I would rather initiate the test from within PHPStorm or from the command line.

Here are my PHP, Debug, and PBGp Proxy Settings as well: