Xdebug [1] provides a range of useful functionality for PHP developers, including detailed error information, code coverage and profiling support, and support for remote debugging using the GDB or DBGp protocols. At present, there are several DBGp implementations available as part of larger IDEs [2], however there is currently no standalone GUI application that can be run to debug applications using DBGp without tying the developer to a particular IDE.

Under this proposal, a cross-platform GUI application will be developed that implements the DBGp protocol to allow PHP applications to be debugged using Xdebug in a development environment agnostic fashion. This application could then be further developed to include support for other run-time environments that support the DBGp protocol, which includes Python with Komodo [3] and may also include Ruby in the future [4].

[1] http://xdebug.org/
[2] http://xdebug.org/docs-debugger.php#clients
[3] http://aspn.activestate.com/ASPN/docs/Komodo/4.0/komodo-doc-debugpython.html
[4] http://dev.eclipse.org/mhonarc/lists/dltk-dev/msg00001.html