TYPO3 test coverage in under 2 minutes with PhpStorm + phpdbg

phpdbg can generate PHPUnit coverage much faster than Xdebug. Here’s how to use it in TYPO3 projects — directly from PhpStorm or via CLI — and get coverage in under a couple of minutes on typical setups.

Why phpdbg for coverage?

• No need to enable Xdebug (keeps runtime fast)
• Good performance for coverage generation
• Works well locally and in CI

Prerequisites

• phpdbg available in your PHP installation (most distributions package it alongside PHP)
• A working phpunit.xml(.dist)

Check availability:

phpdbg -h

If not found, install/enable phpdbg for your platform (e.g., apt-get install php7.4-phpdbg or the equivalent for your PHP version).

Run coverage via CLI

From your project root:

phpdbg -qrr ./vendor/bin/phpunit \
  --configuration phpunit.xml \
  --coverage-html build/coverage \
  --coverage-clover build/coverage/clover.xml

Notes:

• -qrr runs phpunit inside phpdbg.
• Adjust paths as needed. build/coverage will contain the HTML report.

PhpStorm configuration (use phpdbg)

1. Settings → PHP → Test Frameworks → Add PHPUnit by (Remote) Interpreter
   • Interpreter: your local/remote PHP used for the project (Docker/DDEV etc.)
   • Autoloader: vendor/autoload.php
   • Configuration: phpunit.xml(.dist)
2. Run/Debug Configurations → + → PHPUnit
   • Choose your scope (directory, class, method)
   • In "Interpreter Options" add: -d xdebug.mode=off (optional)
   • In "Custom runner" or "Command line" ensure phpdbg is used if your interpreter supports it. If PhpStorm doesn’t expose a toggle, configure your interpreter to point at phpdbg or create a helper script.

Alternative: Create a PhpStorm "PHP Script" configuration that calls:

phpdbg -qrr ./vendor/bin/phpunit --configuration phpunit.xml --coverage-html build/coverage

Then run it like any other configuration; PhpStorm will open the HTML report if you set it up as an artifact.

With DDEV/Docker

If you use DDEV (or Docker), run phpdbg inside the container:

# DDEV
ddev exec phpdbg -qrr ./vendor/bin/phpunit --configuration phpunit.xml --coverage-html build/coverage

# Generic Docker (example container name "web")
docker exec -it web phpdbg -qrr /var/www/html/vendor/bin/phpunit --configuration /var/www/html/phpunit.xml --coverage-html /var/www/html/build/coverage

Map the build/coverage directory to your host to open reports in the browser.

Tips and troubleshooting

• Disable Xdebug for speed: -d xdebug.mode=off or turn it off in your environment.
• Ensure pcov.enabled=0 or other coverage engines are disabled to avoid conflicts.
• Large test suites: generate only HTML or only Clover to reduce I/O time.
• In PhpStorm, if you don’t see the built‑in coverage view for phpdbg: open the HTML report from build/coverage/index.html, or configure Clover report in a compatible plugin/CI.

Example composer scripts

Add convenience scripts to composer.json:

{
  "scripts": {
    "test:coverage": "phpdbg -qrr ./vendor/bin/phpunit --configuration phpunit.xml --coverage-html build/coverage --coverage-clover build/coverage/clover.xml"
  }
}

Run with:

composer run test:coverage
# or with DDEV
ddev composer test:coverage

That’s it — use phpdbg to get quick code coverage locally and in CI without the overhead of Xdebug.