Visual Studio Code - Xdebug won't work

Question

In Visual Studio Code (1.9.1) (mac) i have setup the php-debug plugin.

In the debug screen i start 'listen for Xdebug'.
After this i open the index.php on my XAMPP server (local).
But nothing happens.

• the blue bar at the bottom of the screen turns orange.
• the step over, step into and step out buttons are greyed out.
• Also the following error message occurs at the watched variables:
  cannot evaluate code without an connection

I try to use breakpoints on the following code:

<?php
$i = 0;

do {
$i++;
if (!($i % 1)) {
    echo('<p>$i = ' . $i . '</p>');
    }
}
while ($i < 100);
?>

I am using XAMPP and in my php.ini file i use port 9000 for Xdebug.

zend_extension="/usr/local/Cellar/php71-xdebug/2.5.0/xdebug.so"
xdebug.remote_enable = 1
xdebug.remote_autostart = 1
xdebug.remote.port=9000

I installed Xdebug using homebrew.
Here is my php info: phpinfo.htm
Xdebug wizard tells me Xdebug is installed correctly.

my launch.json file looks like this:

{
"version": "0.2.0",
"configurations": [
    {
        "name": "Listen for XDebug",
        "type": "php",
        "request": "launch",
        "port": 9000,
        "log": true
    },
    {
        "name": "Launch currently open script",
        "type": "php",
        "request": "launch",
        "program": "${file}",
        "cwd": "${fileDirname}",
        "port": 9000
    }
]
}

Would anyone know what i am doing wrong?

After setting the xdebug.remote_connect_back = 1 in the ini file
as n00dl3 suggested debugging most of the time works, but once in a while i get the following
error in the debug console:

<- threadEvent
ThreadEvent {
  seq: 0,
  type: 'event',
  event: 'thread',
  body: { reason: 'exited', threadId: 1 } }

Answer 1

I encountered this problem as well, not with the same environment (NGINX server + php-fpm) but the same symptoms. It turned out to be caused by my xdebug configuration.

How I managed to diagnose it : by writing a simple PHP script for test just like OP did :

<?php

xdebug_info();

By browsing to it, I got a bunch of info on my setup, including :

xdebug.client_host => localhost
xdebug.client_port => 9003

whereas my xdebug was listening on port 9900 (default being 9000).

Steps to fix : just add the following lines to your php.ini or xdebug.ini (wherever the rest of your xdebug configuration lies) :

# This should match your xdebug.remote_host
xdebug.client_host=localhost
# This should match your xdebug.remote_port
xdebug.client_port=9900
xdebug.mode=debug

Then rerun a debug session in VScode, add some breakpoints, and re-browse to your script : my VScode window popped up, the execution was paused on the breakpoint and the variables where accessible in the debug pannel just like expected.

EDIT : don't forget to also :

• add xdebug.mode=debug to your php.ini
• restart webserver and php-fpm services.