NAME

Catalyst::Plugin::ErrorCatcher - Catch application errors and emit them somewhere

VERSION

version 0.0.8.21

SYNOPSIS

  use Catalyst qw/-Debug StackTrace ErrorCatcher/;

DESCRIPTION

This plugin allows you to do More Stuff with the information that would normally only be seen on the Catalyst Error Screen courtesy of the Catalyst::Plugin::StackTrace plugin.

setup($c, $@)

Prepare the plugin for use.

finalize_error($c)

If configured, and needed, deal with raised errors.

my_finalize_error($c)

This is the method that's called by "finalize_error" when we do want to use ErrorCatcher to format and emit some information.

emitters_init($c)

This routine initialises the emitters enabled in the configuration for the plugin.

append_feedback($stringref, $data)

This is a small utility method that simplifies some of the work needed to add some data to a string-reference, including some basic checks and initialisation.

append_feedback_emptyline

Add an empty-line to the string-reference of data being built.

append_feedback_keyvalue($ref, $key, $value, $keypadding)

Add:

    {key}: value

to the feedback data being prepared.

$keypadding is optional. If omitted, defaults to 8.

sanitise_param($value)

Local implementation of "qquote" in Data::Dumper and general sanity checks and transformations of the data in a given piece of data.

append_output_params($ref, $label, $params)

Given a hashref of related items, $params, and a $label for the grouping, add sensibly formatted output to the feedback data being constructed.

CONFIGURATION

The plugin is configured in a similar manner to other Catalyst plugins:

  <Plugin::ErrorCatcher>
      enable                1
      context               5
      always_log            0
      include_session       0
      user_identified_by    username

      emit_module           A::Module
  </Plugin::ErrorCatcher>

enable

Setting this to true forces the module to work its voodoo.

It's also enabled if the value is unset and you're running Catalyst in debug-mode.

context

When there is stack-trace information to share, how many lines of context to show around the line that caused the error.

emit_module

This specifies which module to use for custom output behaviour.

You can chain multiple modules by specifying a line in the config for each module you'd like used:

    emit_module A::Module
    emit_module Another::Module
    emit_module Yet::Another::Module

If none are specified, or all that are specified fail, the default behaviour is to log the prepared message at the INFO level via "$c->log()".

For details on how to implement a custom emitter see "CUSTOM EMIT CLASSES" in this documentation.

always_log

The default plugin behaviour when using one or more emitter modules is to suppress the info log message if one or more of them succeeded.

If you wish to log the information, via "$c->log()" then set this value to 1.

include_session

The default behaviour is to suppress potentially sensitive and revealing session-data in the error report.

If you feel that this information is useful in your investigations set the value to true.

When set to 1 the report will include a "Data::Dump::pp()" representation of the request's session.

user_identified_by

If there's a logged-in user use the specified value as the method to identify the user.

If the specified value is invalid the module defaults to using id.

If unspecified the value defaults to id.

STACKTRACE IN REPORTS WHEN NOT RUNNING IN DEBUG MODE

It is possible to run your application in non-Debug mode, and still have errors reported with a stack-trace.

Include the StackTrace and ErrorCatcher plugins in MyApp.pm:

  use Catalyst qw<
    ErrorCatcher
    StackTrace
  >;

Set up your "myapp.conf" to include the following:

  <stacktrace>
    enable      1
  </stacktrace>

  <Plugin::ErrorCatcher>
    enable      1
    # include other options here
  <Plugin::ErrorCatcher>

Any exceptions should now show your user the "Please come back later" screen whilst still capturing and emitting a report with stack-trace.

PROVIDED EMIT CLASSES

Catalyst::Plugin::ErrorCatcher::Email

This module uses MIME::Lite to send the prepared output to a specified email address.

See Catalyst::Plugin::ErrorCatcher::Email for usage and configuration details.

CUSTOM EMIT CLASSES

A custom emit class takes the following format:

  package A::Module;
  # vim: ts=8 sts=4 et sw=4 sr sta
  use strict;
  use warnings;
  
  sub emit {
    my ($class, $c, $output) = @_;
  
    $c->log->info(
      'IGNORING OUTPUT FROM Catalyst::Plugin::ErrorCatcher'
    );
  
    return;
  }
  
  1;
  __END__

The only requirement is that you have a sub called "emit".

"Catalyst::Plugin::ErrorCatcher" passes the following parameters in the call to "emit()":

$class: The package name
$c: A Context object
$output: The processed output from "Catalyst::Plugin::ErrorCatcher"

If you want to use the original error message you should use:

  my @error = @{ $c->error };

You may use and abuse any Catalyst methods, or other Perl modules as you see fit.

KNOWN ISSUES

BODY tests failing (Catalyst >=5.90008): Summary: https://github.com/chiselwright/catalyst-plugin-errorcatcher/pull/1
Bug report: https://rt.cpan.org/Public/Bug/Display.html?id=75607

THANKS

The authors of Catalyst::Plugin::StackTrace, from which a lot of code was used.

Ash Berlin for guiding me in the right direction after a known hacky first implementation.

# vim: ts=8 sts=4 et sw=4 sr sta

AUTHOR

Chisel <chisel@chizography.net>

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.

CONTRIBUTORS

Chisel Wright <chisel@chizography.net>
Fitz Elliott <fitz.elliott@gmail.com>
Mohammad S Anwar <mohammad.anwar@yahoo.com>
Tim Bunce <tim@tigerlms.com>