I'd like to test that Custom::Runner.run rescues all StandardErrors and fires an alert with the exception.
I'm having some trouble figuring out how to stub the call to my custom error class, Custom::Error, and expecting that Custom::Alert.error was received with the double as an argument.
Here's a complete test case to demonstrate the issue:
module Custom
class Error < StandardError
end
end
module Custom
class Alert
def self.error(exception, context = {})
end
end
end
module Custom
class Runner
def self.run
request
rescue => e
Custom::Alert.error(e, { foo: :bar })
end
class << self
def request
raise Custom::Error.new('test')
end
end
end
end
Here's the test:
RSpec.describe Custom::Runner do
describe '.run' do
let(:custom_error_double) { instance_double(Custom::Error) }
before do
# could this be the culprit?
allow(Custom::Error).to receive(:new)
.with('test')
.and_return(custom_error_double, 'test')
end
it 'fires a custom alert' do
expect(Custom::Alert).to receive(:error)
.with(custom_error_double, foo: :bar)
described_class.run
end
end
end
The test fails:
Failures:
1) Custom::Runner.run fires a custom alert
Failure/Error: Custom::Alert.error(e, { foo: :bar })
#<Custom::Alert (class)> received :error with unexpected arguments
expected: (#<InstanceDouble(Custom::Error) (anonymous)>, {:foo=>:bar})
got: (#<TypeError: exception class/object expected>, {:foo=>:bar})
Diff:
## -1,2 +1,2 ##
-[#<InstanceDouble(Custom::Error) (anonymous)>, {:foo=>:bar}]
+[#<TypeError: exception class/object expected>, {:foo=>:bar}]
I believe this is because rescue requires an exception and I'm returning a double. I've tried raising .and_raise(custom_error_double), but I continue to get the same TypeError: exception class/object expected.
There must be something I'm missing here. Any advice would be appreciated.
I guess the instance double of Custom::Error is an InstanceDouble object and not an Exception object so when you raise the double it causes the TypeError.
You could replace the double
let(:custom_error_double) { instance_double(Custom::Error) }
with a real Custom::Error object
let(:custom_error) { Custom::Error.new }
to avoid that.
I believe that you have it exactly right that the exception vs. the double is the issue. The error specifically is received :error with unexpected arguments, and the comparison is that the double does not match the TypeError. In this case, the blind rescue => e then calls Custom::Alert.error(e, {foo: :bar}) (which has the TypeError as the argument e), but in your test the .with() is expecting the double.
This will work:
RSpec.describe Custom::Runner do
describe '.run' do
let(:custom_error) { Custom::Error.new }
before do
allow(Custom::Error).to receive(:new).with('test').and_return(custom_error, 'test')
end
it 'fires a custom alert' do
expect(Custom::Alert).to receive(:error).with(custom_error, foo: :bar)
described_class.run
end
end
end
I'm trying to understand how errors propogate between classes in Ruby. I have this so far:
class User
def charge
puts "charging order soon"
raise RuntimeError.new("This is a runtime error")
rescue ArgumentError
puts "should never gets here"
end
end
class Runner
def run
begin
User.new.charge
rescue RuntimeError => e
puts e.message
end
end
end
Runner.new.run
When I run this, I get this which seems right:
$ ruby errors.rb
charging order soon
This is a runtime error
Inside runner, can I rescue from the RuntimeError with a specific message? If I have multiple RuntimeErrors being raised around my application, is there any way for the Runner's rescue clause to be raised only for RuntimeErrors with specific messages?
See https://stackoverflow.com/a/23771227/2981429
If you call raise inside a rescue block, the last raised exception will be re-raised.
In your exception block, you can check the message and choose to re-raise or not:
begin
User.new.charge
rescue RuntimeError => e
case e.message
when "This is a runtime error"
# put your handler code here
else
raise # re-raise the last exception
end
end
However if it's your goal to solely rescue errors that you yourself raise manually, then it's probably easier to define a custom error class instead:
class MyError < StandardError; end
Then instead of raise RuntimeError.new("message") use raise MyError.new("message"), and rescue it normally:
begin
User.new.charge
rescue MyError => e
# handler
end
This way you don't have to worry about your rescues interfering with the built-in exceptions.
Ruby's Test::Unit has assert_nothing_raised. Test::Unit has been replaced by MiniTest. Why don't MiniTest's assertions / expectations have anything parallel to this? For example you can expect must_raise but not wont_raise.
MiniTest does implement assert_nothing_raised in its Test::Unit compatibility layer, but in its own tests (MiniTest::Unit and MiniTest::Spec) it does not implement any test like this. The reason is, the programmer argues, that testing for nothing raised is not a test of anything; you never expect anything to be raised in a test, except when you are testing for an exception. If an unexpected (uncaught) exception occurs in the code for a test, you'll get an exception reported in good order by the test and you'll know you have a problem.
Example:
require 'minitest/autorun'
describe "something" do
it "does something" do
Ooops
end
end
Output:
Run options: --seed 41521
# Running tests:
E
Finished tests in 0.000729s, 1371.7421 tests/s, 0.0000 assertions/s.
1) Error:
test_0001_does_something(something):
NameError: uninitialized constant Ooops
untitled:5:in `block (2 levels) in <main>'
1 tests, 0 assertions, 0 failures, 1 errors, 0 skips
Which is exactly what you wanted to know. If you were expecting nothing to be raised, you didn't get it and you've been told so.
So, the argument here is: do not use assert_nothing_raised! It's just a meaningless crutch. See, for example:
https://github.com/seattlerb/minitest/issues/70
https://github.com/seattlerb/minitest/issues/159
http://blog.zenspider.com/blog/2012/01/assert_nothing_tested.html
On the other hand, clearly assert_nothing_raised corresponds to some intuition among users, since so many people expect a wont_raise to go with must_raise, etc. In particular one would like to focus an assertion on this, not merely a test. Luckily, MiniTest is extremely minimalist and flexible, so if you want to add your own routine, you can. So you can write a method that tests for no exception and returns a known outcome if there is no exception, and now you can assert for that known outcome.
For example (I'm not saying this is perfect, just showing the idea):
class TestMyRequire < MiniTest::Spec
def testForError # pass me a block and I'll tell you if it raised
yield
"ok"
rescue
$!
end
it "blends" do
testForError do
something_or_other
end.must_equal "ok"
end
end
The point is not that this is a good or bad idea but that it was never the responsibility of MiniTest to do it for you.
If you need it:
# test_helper.rb
module Minitest::Assertions
def assert_nothing_raised(*)
yield
end
end
And to use it:
def test_unknown_setter
assert_nothing_raised do
result.some_silly_column_name = 'value'
end
end
This bothered me enough to dig into the MiniTest sources and provide an implementation in my spec_helper.rb file:
module MiniTest
module Assertions
def refute_raises *exp
msg = "#{exp.pop}.\n" if String === exp.last
begin
yield
rescue MiniTest::Skip => e
return e if exp.include? MiniTest::Skip
raise e
rescue Exception => e
exp = exp.first if exp.size == 1
flunk "unexpected exception raised: #{e}"
end
end
end
module Expectations
infect_an_assertion :refute_raises, :wont_raise
end
end
Hope this proves helpful to someone else who also needs wont_raise. Cheers! :)
How do I add information to an exception message without changing its class in ruby?
The approach I'm currently using is
strings.each_with_index do |string, i|
begin
do_risky_operation(string)
rescue
raise $!.class, "Problem with string number #{i}: #{$!}"
end
end
Ideally, I would also like to preserve the backtrace.
Is there a better way?
To reraise the exception and modify the message, while preserving the exception class and its backtrace, simply do:
strings.each_with_index do |string, i|
begin
do_risky_operation(string)
rescue Exception => e
raise $!, "Problem with string number #{i}: #{$!}", $!.backtrace
end
end
Which will yield:
# RuntimeError: Problem with string number 0: Original error message here
# backtrace...
It's not much better, but you can just reraise the exception with a new message:
raise $!, "Problem with string number #{i}: #{$!}"
You can also get a modified exception object yourself with the exception method:
new_exception = $!.exception "Problem with string number #{i}: #{$!}"
raise new_exception
I realize I'm 6 years late to this party, but...I thought I understood Ruby error handling until this week and ran across this question. While the answers are useful, there is non-obvious (and undocumented) behavior that may be useful to future readers of this thread. All code was run under ruby v2.3.1.
#Andrew Grimm asks
How do I add information to an exception message without changing its class in ruby?
and then provides sample code:
raise $!.class, "Problem with string number #{i}: #{$!}"
I think it is critical to point out that this does NOT add information to the original error instance object, but instead raises a NEW error object with the same class.
#BoosterStage says
To reraise the exception and modify the message...
but again, the provided code
raise $!, "Problem with string number #{i}: #{$!}", $!.backtrace
will raise a new instance of whatever error class is referenced by $!, but it will not be the exact same instance as $!.
The difference between #Andrew Grimm's code and #BoosterStage's example is the fact that the first argument to #raise in the first case is a Class, whereas in the second case it is an instance of some (presumably) StandardError. The difference matters because the documentation for Kernel#raise says:
With a single String argument, raises a RuntimeError with the string as a message. Otherwise, the first parameter should be the name of an Exception class (or an object that returns an Exception object when sent an exception message).
If only one argument is given and it is an error object instance, that object will be raised IF that object's #exception method inherits or implements the default behavior defined in Exception#exception(string):
With no argument, or if the argument is the same as the receiver, return the receiver. Otherwise, create a new exception object of the same class as the receiver, but with a message equal to string.to_str.
As many would guess:
catch StandardError => e
raise $!
raises the same error referenced by $!, the same as simply calling:
catch StandardError => e
raise
but probably not for the reasons one might think. In this case, the call to raise is NOT just raising the object in $!...it raises the result of $!.exception(nil), which in this case happens to be $!.
To clarify this behavior, consider this toy code:
class TestError < StandardError
def initialize(message=nil)
puts 'initialize'
super
end
def exception(message=nil)
puts 'exception'
return self if message.nil? || message == self
super
end
end
Running it (this is the same as #Andrew Grimm's sample which I quoted above):
2.3.1 :071 > begin ; raise TestError, 'message' ; rescue => e ; puts e ; end
results in:
initialize
message
So a TestError was initialized, rescued, and had its message printed. So far so good. A second test (analogous to #BoosterStage's sample quoted above):
2.3.1 :073 > begin ; raise TestError.new('foo'), 'bar' ; rescue => e ; puts e ; end
The somewhat surprising results:
initialize
exception
bar
So a TestError was initialized with 'foo', but then #raise has called #exception on the first argument (an instance of TestError) and passed in the message of 'bar' to create a second instance of TestError, which is what ultimately gets raised.
TIL.
Also, like #Sim, I am very concerned about preserving any original backtrace context, but instead of implementing a custom error handler like his raise_with_new_message, Ruby's Exception#cause has my back: whenever I want to catch an error, wrap it in a domain-specific error and then raise that error, I still have the original backtrace available via #cause on the domain-specific error being raised.
The point of all this is that--like #Andrew Grimm--I want to raise errors with more context; specifically, I want to only raise domain-specific errors from certain points in my app that can have many network-related failure modes. Then my error reporting can be made to handle the domain errors at the top level of my app and I have all the context I need for logging/reporting by calling #cause recursively until I get to the "root cause".
I use something like this:
class BaseDomainError < StandardError
attr_reader :extra
def initialize(message = nil, extra = nil)
super(message)
#extra = extra
end
end
class ServerDomainError < BaseDomainError; end
Then if I am using something like Faraday to make calls to a remote REST service, I can wrap all possible errors into a domain-specific error and pass in extra info (which I believe is the original question of this thread):
class ServiceX
def initialize(foo)
#foo = foo
end
def get_data(args)
begin
# This method is not defined and calling it will raise an error
make_network_call_to_service_x(args)
rescue StandardError => e
raise ServerDomainError.new('error calling service x', binding)
end
end
end
Yeah, that's right: I literally just realized I can set the extra info to the current binding to grab all local vars defined at the time the ServerDomainError is instantiated/raised. This test code:
begin
ServiceX.new(:bar).get_data(a: 1, b: 2)
rescue
puts $!.extra.receiver
puts $!.extra.local_variables.join(', ')
puts $!.extra.local_variable_get(:args)
puts $!.extra.local_variable_get(:e)
puts eval('self.instance_variables', $!.extra)
puts eval('self.instance_variable_get(:#foo)', $!.extra)
end
will output:
#<ServiceX:0x00007f9b10c9ef48>
args, e
{:a=>1, :b=>2}
undefined method `make_network_call_to_service_x' for #<ServiceX:0x00007f9b10c9ef48 #foo=:bar>
#foo
bar
Now a Rails controller calling ServiceX doesn't particularly need to know that ServiceX is using Faraday (or gRPC, or anything else), it just makes the call and handles BaseDomainError. Again: for logging purposes, a single handler at the top level can recursively log all the #causes of any caught errors, and for any BaseDomainError instances in the error chain it can also log the extra values, potentially including the local variables pulled from the encapsulated binding(s).
I hope this tour has been as useful for others as it was for me. I learned a lot.
UPDATE: Skiptrace looks like it adds the bindings to Ruby errors.
Also, see this other post for info about how the implementation of Exception#exception will clone the object (copying instance variables).
Here's another way:
class Exception
def with_extra_message extra
exception "#{message} - #{extra}"
end
end
begin
1/0
rescue => e
raise e.with_extra_message "you fool"
end
# raises an exception "ZeroDivisionError: divided by 0 - you fool" with original backtrace
(revised to use the exception method internally, thanks #Chuck)
My approach would be to extend the rescued error with an anonymous module that extends the error's message method:
def make_extended_message(msg)
Module.new do
##msg = msg
def message
super + ##msg
end
end
end
begin
begin
raise "this is a test"
rescue
raise($!.extend(make_extended_message(" that has been extended")))
end
rescue
puts $! # just says "this is a test"
puts $!.message # says extended message
end
That way, you don't clobber any other information in the exception (i.e. its backtrace).
I put my vote that Ryan Heneise's answer should be the accepted one.
This is a common problem in complex applications and preserving the original backtrace is often critical so much so that we have a utility method in our ErrorHandling helper module for this.
One of the problems we discovered was that sometimes trying to generate more meaningful messages when a system is in a messed up state would result in exceptions being generated inside the exception handler itself which led us to harden our utility function as follows:
def raise_with_new_message(*args)
ex = args.first.kind_of?(Exception) ? args.shift : $!
msg = begin
sprintf args.shift, *args
rescue Exception => e
"internal error modifying exception message for #{ex}: #{e}"
end
raise ex, msg, ex.backtrace
end
When things go well
begin
1/0
rescue => e
raise_with_new_message "error dividing %d by %d: %s", 1, 0, e
end
you get a nicely modified message
ZeroDivisionError: error dividing 1 by 0: divided by 0
from (irb):19:in `/'
from (irb):19
from /Users/sim/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.0.0-p247/bin/irb:16:in `<main>'
When things go badly
begin
1/0
rescue => e
# Oops, not passing enough arguments here...
raise_with_new_message "error dividing %d by %d: %s", e
end
you still don't lose track of the big picture
ZeroDivisionError: internal error modifying exception message for divided by 0: can't convert ZeroDivisionError into Integer
from (irb):25:in `/'
from (irb):25
from /Users/sim/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.0.0-p247/bin/irb:16:in `<main>'
Here's what I ended up doing:
Exception.class_eval do
def prepend_message(message)
mod = Module.new do
define_method :to_s do
message + super()
end
end
self.extend mod
end
def append_message(message)
mod = Module.new do
define_method :to_s do
super() + message
end
end
self.extend mod
end
end
Examples:
strings = %w[a b c]
strings.each_with_index do |string, i|
begin
do_risky_operation(string)
rescue
raise $!.prepend_message "Problem with string number #{i}:"
end
end
=> NoMethodError: Problem with string number 0:undefined method `do_risky_operation' for main:Object
and:
pry(main)> exception = 0/0 rescue $!
=> #<ZeroDivisionError: divided by 0>
pry(main)> exception = exception.append_message('. With additional info!')
=> #<ZeroDivisionError: divided by 0. With additional info!>
pry(main)> exception.message
=> "divided by 0. With additional info!"
pry(main)> exception.to_s
=> "divided by 0. With additional info!"
pry(main)> exception.inspect
=> "#<ZeroDivisionError: divided by 0. With additional info!>"
This is similar to Mark Rushakoff's answer but:
Overrides to_s instead of message since by default message is defined as simply to_s (at least in Ruby 2.0 and 2.2 where I tested it)
Calls extend for you instead of making the caller do that extra step.
Uses define_method and a closure so that the local variable message can be referenced. When I tried using a class variable ##message, it warned, "warning: class variable access from toplevel" (See this question: "Since you're not creating a class with the class keyword, your class variable is being set on Object, not [your anonymous module]")
Features:
Easy to use
Reuses the same object (instead of creating a new instance of the class), so things like object identity, class, and backtrace are preserved
to_s, message, and inspect all respond appropriately
Can be used with an exception that is already stored in a variable; doesn't require you to re-raise anything (like the solution that involved passing the backtrace to raise: raise $!, …, $!.backtrace). This was important to me since the exception was passed in to my logging method, not something I had rescued myself.
Most of these answers are incredibly convoluted. Maybe they were necessary in Ruby 1.8 or whatever, but in modern versions* this is totally straightforward and intuitive. Just rescue => e, append to e.message, and raise.
begin
raise 'oops'
rescue => e
e.message << 'y daisy'
raise
end
Traceback (most recent call last):
4: from /Users/david/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.7.2/bin/irb:23:in `<main>'
3: from /Users/david/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.7.2/bin/irb:23:in `load'
2: from /Users/david/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.7.2/lib/ruby/gems/2.7.0/gems/irb-1.2.6/exe/irb:11:in `<top (required)>'
1: from (irb):2
RuntimeError (oopsy daisy)
* I've only tested with 2.7.2 and 3.1.2, but I assume everything in between is covered, and probably some earlier versions of 2.x as well.
Another approach would be to add context (extra information) about the exception as a hash instead of as a string.
Check out this pull request where I proposed adding a few new methods to make it really easy to add extra context information to exceptions, like this:
begin
…
User.find_each do |user|
reraise_with_context(user: user) do
send_reminder_email(user)
end
end
…
rescue
# $!.context[:user], etc. is available here
report_error $!, $!.context
end
or even:
User.find_each.reraise_with_context do |user|
send_reminder_email(user)
end
The nice thing about this approach is that it lets you add extra information in a very concise way. And it doesn't even require you to define new exception classes inside which to wrap the original exceptions.
As much as I like #Lemon Cat's answer for many reasons, and it's certainly appropriate for some cases, I feel like if what you are actually trying to do is attach additional information about the original exception, it seems preferable to just attach it directly to that exception it pertains to rather than inventing a new wrapper exception (and adding another layer of indirection).
Another example:
class ServiceX
def get_data(args)
reraise_with_context(StandardError, binding: binding, service: self.class, callee: __callee__) do
# This method is not defined and calling it will raise an error
make_network_call_to_service_x(args)
end
end
end
The downside of this approach is that you have to update your error handling to actually use the information that may be available in exception.context. But you would have to do that anyway in order to recursively call cause to get to the root excetion.
It's possible to use :cause key to prevent message duplication
The cause of the generated exception (accessible via Exception#cause) is automatically set to the "current" exception ($!), if any. An alternative value, either an Exception object or nil, can be specified via the :cause argument.
begin
do_risky_operation
rescue => e
raise e.class, "#{e.message} (some extra message)", e.backtrace, cause: nil
end
short:
Is there a way in Ruby to DRY-ify this:
def entry_point_one
begin
do_something
rescue MySyntaxErrorOne, MySyntaxErrorTwo, MySyntaxErrorEtc => syn_err
raise syn_err.exception(syn_err.message)
end
end
def entry_point_two
begin
do_something_else
rescue MySyntaxErrorOne, MySyntaxErrorTwo, MySyntaxErrorEtc => syn_err
raise syn_err.exception(syn_err.message)
end
end
longer:
I'm building an interpreter. This interpreter can be called using different entry points. If I feed this interpreter a 'dirty' string, I expect it to raise an error. However, it would be nice if I don't get spammed by the by the entire back trace of every method called directly or indirectly by do_something, especially since the interpreter makes use of recursion.
As you can see in the above snippet, I already know a way to re raise an error and thereby removing the back trace. What I would like do is remove the duplication in the above example. The closest I have come thus far is this:
def entry_point_one
re_raise_known_exceptions {do_something}
end
def entry_point_two
re_raise_known_exceptions {do_something_else}
end
def re_raise_known_exceptions
yield
rescue MySyntaxErrorOne, MySyntaxErrorTwo, MySyntaxErrorEtc => syn_err
raise syn_err.exception(syn_err.message)
end
But that makes the method re-raise-known-exceptions show up in the back trace.
edit: I guess what I want would be something like a C pre-processing macro
You can just use the splat on an array.
Straight from IRB:
COMMON_ERRORS = [ArgumentError, RuntimeError] # add your own
def f
yield
rescue *COMMON_ERRORS => err
puts "Got an error of type #{err.class}"
end
f{ raise ArgumentError.new }
Got an error of type ArgumentError
f{ raise 'abc' }
Got an error of type RuntimeError
while thinking about it a bit more, I came up with this:
interpreter_block {do_something}
def interpreter_block
yield
rescue ExceptionOne, ExceptionTwo, ExceptionEtc => exc
raise exc.exception(exc.message)
end
Although it's still not quiet what I would like to have, at least now the extra entry in the back trace has become somewhat better looking.
It might be slightly evil, but I think you can simply remove the line from the backtrace ;-)
COMMON_ERRORS = [ArgumentError, RuntimeError]
def interpreter_block
yield
rescue *COMMON_ERRORS => err
err.backtrace.delete_if{ |line| line=~/interpreter_block/ }
raise err
end
I'm not sure it's such a good idea though. You'll have a hell of a lot of fun debugging your interpreter afterward ;-)
Side note: Treetop may be of interest to you.
This is a touch hackish, but as far as cleaning up the backtrace goes, something like this works nicely:
class Interpreter
def method1
error_catcher{ puts 1 / 0 }
end
def error_catcher
yield
rescue => err
err.set_backtrace(err.backtrace - err.backtrace[1..2])
raise err
end
end
The main trick is this line err.set_backtrace(err.backtrace - err.backtrace[1..2]). Without it, we get the following (from IRB):
ZeroDivisionError: divided by 0
from (irb):43:in `/'
from (irb):43:in `block in method1'
from (irb):47:in `error_catcher'
from (irb):43:in `method1'
from (irb):54
from /Users/peterwagenet/.ruby_versions/ruby-1.9.1-p129/bin/irb:12:in `<main>'
What we don't want in there are the second and third lines. So we remove them, ending up with:
ZeroDivisionError: divided by 0
from (irb):73:in `/'
from (irb):73:in `method1'
from (irb):84
from /Users/peterwagenet/.ruby_versions/ruby-1.9.1-p129/bin/irb:12:in `<main>'
If you have all of the information you need in the exceptions, and you do not need the backtrace at all, you can just define your own error and raise that, instead of reraising the existing exception. This will give it a fresh backtrace. (Of course, presumably your sample code is incomplete and there is other processing happening in the rescue block -- otherwise your best bet is to just let the error bubble up naturally.)
class MyError < StandardError; end
def interpreter_block
yield
rescue ExceptionOne, ExceptionTwo, ExceptionEtc => exc
raise MyError
end