JSON report prints deprecations in text before the JSON

[braver]

Describe the bug

If you run with the --report=json flag, deprecation warnings are printed out first in plain text, then the json output follows. A major use case for the JSON report is to have reliably parsable output, which this breaks.

Reported originally at SublimeLinter/SublimeLinter-phpcs#59

Code sample

Any code that triggers sniff that are deprecated for 4.0. I'm sorry, I don't have a case at hand currently.

Custom ruleset

None.

To reproduce

Steps to reproduce the behavior:

1. Create a file called test.php with the code sample above...
2. Run phpcs --report=json -s test.php
3. See error message displayed

WARNING: The WordPress standard uses 1 deprecated sniff
  -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
  -  Generic.Functions.CallTimePassByReference
     This sniff has been deprecated since v3.12.1 and will be removed in v4.0.0.

  Deprecated sniffs are still run, but will stop working at some point in the
  future.

  {"totals":{"errors":1,"warnings":1,"fixable":2},"files":{ (... JSON snipped)

Expected behavior

Deprecation warnings should perhaps be grouped under the warnings in the JSON output. Or a flag might be introduced to silence deprecation warnings.

Versions (please complete the following information)

Operating System	MacOS 15.5
PHP version	8.4.6
PHP_CodeSniffer version	3.13.2
Standard	PSR12
Install type	Composer local

Additional context

We're using the JSON output to be able to parse it and present it in the context of the SublimeLinter plugin for Sublime Text. I'm a maintainer of said plugin, and use phpcs daily in that mode (but haven't run into the problem myself yet).

Please confirm

• I have searched the issue list and am not opening a duplicate issue.
• I have read the Contribution Guidelines and this is not a support question.
• I confirm that this bug is a bug in PHP_CodeSniffer and not in one of the external standards.
• I have verified the issue still exists in the master branch of PHP_CodeSniffer.

[jrfnl]

@braver Thanks for reporting this. As of PHPCS 4.0, PHPCS will properly send deprecations to STDERR instead of STDOUT, but that's for the future.

For now, deprecation notices can be silenced by using the -q flag when running PHPCS. That should already solve your problem.

Alternatively, use the --report-json=/path/to/file.json option to pipe just and only the report to a file.

Hope this helps.

[braver]

For now, deprecation notices can be silenced by using the -q flag when running PHPCS. That should already solve your problem.

Fantastic, thanks for the quick reply. We'll give that a go!

[jrfnl]

@braver Let me know how you get on and please close the issue if this solved it.

[jrfnl]

Closing as the downstream issue appears to have been closed in the mean time.

[braver]

@jrfnl thanks for helping us out!