Error handling

[tony.willson]

We struggle to come up with a decent error handling function. I thought that I use a global variable $live to easily make a switch from testing to live. I will keep the function in an include file.
I kind of got there to print a "user-friendly" message when the site is live, but it messes up the whole page layout. Don't how to print the error message in the content area. How would I adjust my error handler and what would I add to ""?

My error handler:
/*-- start output buffering--*/
ob_start();
/*-- live site --*/
$live=TRUE;
/*-- error handling function giving back error number, the actual message, the error file, the error line and the variables (what are variable in this context?) --*/
function my_error_handler ($e_number, $e_message, $e_file, $e_line, $e_vars) {
/*-- make $live global --*/
global $live;
/*-- set error message for testing together --*/
$message="Error in file '$e_file' on line $e_line: $e_message\n";
$message.=print_r($e_vars,1);
/*-- error message for live site should not give any detail about problem, just an apology --*/
if($live){
$user="We apologise for the problems on this page...";
/*-- if there are error messages print the standard user message --*/
if ($message==0){echo $user;}else{
/*-- otherwise say 'hi there' --*/
echo ('');}
/*-- do it only once as user should not see the apology more than once --*/
exit();
} else {
/*-- if site is in testing print the acual error messages --*/
echo '

'.$message.'

';
}
}
ob_end_flush();
/*-- as everything is defined now, set the error handler, so it's ready to be used --*/
set_error_handler('my_error_handler');
?>

Also, in the bit "if ($message==0)" I would have thought that comparing $message to 1 would have printed the user-friendly error message (as I thought 1 means that there is one or more error message).


Any help appreciated.