What are the best practices for handling error messages and debugging in PHP scripts?

When handling error messages and debugging in PHP scripts, it is important to display meaningful error messages to help identify and resolve issues. Use functions like error_reporting() and ini_set() to control error reporting levels. Additionally, utilize try-catch blocks for handling exceptions and use tools like Xdebug for more advanced debugging capabilities.

// Set error reporting level
error_reporting(E_ALL);
ini_set('display_errors', 1);

// Example of try-catch block for handling exceptions
try {
    // Code that may throw an exception
    $result = 10 / 0;
} catch (Exception $e) {
    // Handle the exception
    echo "An error occurred: " . $e->getMessage();
}

// Example of using Xdebug for debugging
xdebug_start_trace();
// Code to debug
xdebug_stop_trace();