How to alter or log a variable in a plugin?

Question

Background

I've built a custom shipping method. It follows almost an identical pattern to the magento shipping method classes. It works as expected. Then I added a plugin to check if a coupon code was entered the field would appear. This works as well.

The Issue

I want to attach the coupon name to the shipping method title. So instead of saying "Event Pickup FREE" it says "EVENT LOCATION - Event Pickup - FREE". Making an afterCollectRates function I would assume I would need to alter the $result variable.

I can't seem to figure out how to:

1. Properly alter $result to override the data.

2. Debug or log $result to see the structure of the object. In hopes to alter it.

Shipping Method Function

  public function collectRates(RateRequest $request)
  {
    if (!$this->getConfigFlag('active')) {
        return false;
    }

    /** @var \Magento\Shipping\Model\Rate\Result $result */
    $result = $this->_rateResultFactory->create();

    /** @var \Magento\Quote\Model\Quote\Address\RateResult\Method $method */
    $method = $this->_rateMethodFactory->create();

    $method->setCarrier($this->_code);
    $method->setCarrierTitle($this->getConfigData('title'));

    $method->setMethod($this->_code);
    $method->setMethodTitle($this->getConfigData('name'));  //<--This is what the plugin should change

    $method->setPrice('0.00');
    $method->setCost('0.00');

    $result->append($method);

    return $result;
  }

Plugin for Shipping Method

public function afterCollectRates(\Base\Model\Carrier\EventPickup $subject, $result)
{

    if (!$this->checkCouponCode()) {
            return false;
    }

    $couponCode = $this->_coupon->getCouponCode()


    $this->_logger->debug($couponCode); //<--This works and shows up on log

    return $result;
}

I've attempted to use the logger, debug, var_dump, echo, print_r, var_export and any other combinations. All seem to be no use. The result is usually the same, the magento loader spins forever and nothing regarding $result comes to the log. Thanks for the help!

Answer 1

You can't log objects. But you can log data of it. For debug logging I usually use Zend logger with custom writer:

        $writer = new \Zend\Log\Writer\Stream(BP . '/var/log/test.log');
    $logger = new \Zend\Log\Logger();
    $logger->addWriter($writer);
    $logger->info($result->getAllRates()[0]->getData());

And as you can already guess - you can change your method like this: $result->getAllRates()[0]->setData('data_name', 'new_data_value')

Hope it will help.