CODEWITHSUNDEEP
node.js
myTest532 myTest532
myTest532 myTest532

Reputation: 2381

Best way to handle errors in NodeJS

I started working with NodeJS a couple weeks ago. I am wondering what is the best way to handle errors in NodeJS?

Right now, I am doing it in all my controllers methods. For example:

exports.myMethod = async (req, res, next) => {
   try {
      // My method operations here
   } catch(err) {
      const email = new Email(); // This is a class that I create to notify me when an error happens. errorEmail(mailBody, mailSubject)
      await email.errorEmail(err, "Email Subject - Error");
   }
}

Is it a good way? I mean, is there a better/more efficient way to handle errors in NodeJS?

Thanks

Upvotes: 1

Views: 291

Answers (1)

Always Learning
Always Learning

Reputation: 5591

Error handling when using Promises (or async/await) is pretty straight forward. You don't want to have lots of duplicates of error handling code and extra try/catch blocks all over the place.

The way I find best is to put the error handling at the highest possible level (not deep in the code). If an exception is thrown, or a Promise rejects, then the failure will percolate up to the point where you catch it and handle it. Everything in between doesn't have to do that if it's handled once at the appropriate place.

So your code can start looking cleaner like this:

// module #1
exports.myMethod = async () => {
   // My method operations here
   return result;
}

// module #2
exports.anotherMethod = async () => {
  const result = await module1.myMethod();
  // do more stuff
  return anotherResult;
}

// module #3
exports.topMethod = () => {
  module2.anotherMethod()
    .then((res) => {
      console.log("all done", res);
    })
    .catch((err) => {
      const email = new Email(); // This is a class that I create to notify me when an error happens. errorEmail(mailBody, mailSubject)
      email.errorEmail(err, "Email Subject - Error")
        .then(() => console.log("done, but errors!", err);
    });
}

The nice thing here is that the only place I have to add extra error handling is way at the top. If anything deep in the code fails (and it can get much more deep) then it will just return up the chain naturally.

You are free to put .catch statements anywhere in between for doing retries, or to handle expected errors quietly if you want, but I find using .catch is cleaner that wrapping sections of code with try/catch blocks.

Upvotes: 0

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