Get name of caller function in PHP?

Question

Is there a PHP function to find out the name of the caller function in a given function?

Answer 1

See debug_backtrace - this can trace your call stack all the way to the top.

Here's how you'd get your caller:

$trace = debug_backtrace();
$caller = $trace[1];

echo "Called by {$caller['function']}";
if (isset($caller['class']))
    echo " in {$caller['class']}";

Answer 2

Xdebug provides some nice functions.

<?php
  Class MyClass
  {
    function __construct(){
        $this->callee();
    }
    function callee() {
        echo sprintf("callee() called @ %s: %s from %s::%s",
            xdebug_call_file(),
            xdebug_call_line(),
            xdebug_call_class(),
            xdebug_call_function()
        );
    }
  }
  $rollDebug = new MyClass();
?>

will return trace

callee() called @ /var/www/xd.php: 16 from MyClass::__construct

To install Xdebug on ubuntu the best way is

sudo aptitude install php5-xdebug

You might need to install php5-dev first

sudo aptitude install php5-dev

more info

Answer 3

This is very late but I would like to share the function that will give name of the function from which current function is called.

public function getCallingFunctionName($completeTrace=false)
    {
        $trace=debug_backtrace();
        if($completeTrace)
        {
            $str = '';
            foreach($trace as $caller)
            {
                $str .= " -- Called by {$caller['function']}";
                if (isset($caller['class']))
                    $str .= " From Class {$caller['class']}";
            }
        }
        else
        {
            $caller=$trace[2];
            $str = "Called by {$caller['function']}";
            if (isset($caller['class']))
                $str .= " From Class {$caller['class']}";
        }
        return $str;
    }

I hope this will be useful.

Answer 4

debug_backtrace() supplies details of parameters, function/method calls in the current call stack.

Answer 5

echo debug_backtrace()[1]['function'];

Works since PHP 5.4.

Or optimised (e.g. for non-debug use cases):

echo debug_backtrace( DEBUG_BACKTRACE_IGNORE_ARGS, 2)[1]['function'];

The first argument prevents to populate unused function arguments, the second limits the trace to two levels (we need the second).

Answer 6

Made this and using this myself

/**
 * Gets the caller of the function where this function is called from
 * @param string what to return? (Leave empty to get all, or specify: "class", "function", "line", "class", etc.) - options see: http://php.net/manual/en/function.debug-backtrace.php
 */
function getCaller($what = NULL)
{
    $trace = debug_backtrace();
    $previousCall = $trace[2]; // 0 is this call, 1 is call in previous function, 2 is caller of that function

    if(isset($what))
    {
        return $previousCall[$what];
    }
    else
    {
        return $previousCall;
    }   
}

Answer 7

I just wanted to state that flori's way won't work as a function because it will always return the called function name instead of the caller, but I don't have reputation for commenting. I made a very simple function based on flori's answer that works fine for my case:

class basicFunctions{

    public function getCallerFunction(){
        return debug_backtrace( DEBUG_BACKTRACE_IGNORE_ARGS, 3)[2]['function'];
    }

}

EXAMPLE:

function a($authorisedFunctionsList = array("b")){
    $ref = new basicFunctions;
    $caller = $ref->getCallerFunction();

    if(in_array($caller,$authorisedFunctionsList)):
        echo "Welcome!";
        return true;
    else:
        echo "Unauthorised caller!";
        return false; 
    endif;
}

function b(){
    $executionContinues = $this->a();
    $executionContinues or exit;

    //Do something else..
}

Answer 8

This one worked best for me: var_dump(debug_backtrace());

Answer 9

You can extract this information from the array returned by debug_backtrace

Answer 10

Actually I think debug_print_backtrace() does what you need. http://php.net/manual/en/function.debug-print-backtrace.php

Answer 11

This should work:

$caller = next(debug_backtrace())['function'];

Answer 12

This will do it nicely:

// Outputs an easy to read call trace
// Credit: https://www.php.net/manual/en/function.debug-backtrace.php#112238
// Gist: https://gist.github.com/UVLabs/692e542d3b53e079d36bc53b4ea20a4b

Class MyClass{

public function generateCallTrace()
{
    $e = new Exception();
    $trace = explode("\n", $e->getTraceAsString());
    // reverse array to make steps line up chronologically
    $trace = array_reverse($trace);
    array_shift($trace); // remove {main}
    array_pop($trace); // remove call to this method
    $length = count($trace);
    $result = array();
   
    for ($i = 0; $i < $length; $i++)
    {
        $result[] = ($i + 1)  . ')' . substr($trace[$i], strpos($trace[$i], ' ')); // replace '#someNum' with '$i)', set the right ordering
    }
   
    return "\t" . implode("\n\t", $result);
}

}

// call function where needed to output call trace

/**
Example output:
1) /var/www/test/test.php(15): SomeClass->__construct()
2) /var/www/test/SomeClass.class.php(36): SomeClass->callSomething()
**/```

Answer 13

I created a generic class, which can be helpful to many people who want to see the caller method's trace in a user-readable way. As in one of my projects we needed such information to be logged.

use ReflectionClass;

class DebugUtils
{
    /**
     * Generates debug traces in user readable form
     *
     * @param integer $steps
     * @param boolean $skipFirstEntry
     * @param boolean $withoutNamespaces
     * @return string
     */
    public static function getReadableBackTracke(
        $steps = 4,
        $skipFirstEntry = true,
        $withoutNamespaces = true
    ) {
        $str = '';
        try {
            $backtrace = debug_backtrace(false, $steps);

            // Removing first array entry
            // to make sure getReadableBackTracke() method doesn't gets displayed
            if ($skipFirstEntry)
                array_shift($backtrace);

            // Reserved, so it gets displayed in calling order
            $backtrace = array_reverse($backtrace);

            foreach ($backtrace as $caller) {
                if ($str) {
                    $str .= ' --> ';
                }
                if (isset($caller['class'])) {
                    $class = $caller['class'];
                    if ($withoutNamespaces) {
                        $class = (new ReflectionClass($class))->getShortName();
                    }
                    $str .= $class . $caller['type'];
                }
                $str .= $caller['function'];
            }
        } catch (\Throwable $th) {
            return null;
        }

        return $str;
    }
}

Usage: DebugUtils::getReadableBackTracke()

Sample output:

SomeClass->method1 --> SomeOtherClass->method2 --> TargetClass->targetMethod

Do good and keep helping others, happy coding :)