Error messages #214
Description
📋 Product Requirements Document
PRD: Error messages
Issue: #214
Milestone: Phase 10: Polish & Launch
Labels: ux-improvements, hacktoberfest
PRD: Enhancing Error Messages for MeshHook
Overview
The objective of enhancing error messages within MeshHook is to significantly improve the clarity, specificity, and actionability of error messages across the platform. This initiative is crucial in aligning with MeshHook's overarching goals to offer a user-friendly, robust, and secure workflow engine. By ensuring that users and developers can quickly understand and resolve any issues that arise, we aim to facilitate a smoother workflow creation, execution, and management process.
Objectives
- Clarity: Make error messages more informative and understandable for all users, reducing the technical jargon where possible.
- Speedy Troubleshooting: Assist users and developers in quickly identifying and resolving issues.
- Security: Ensure that the error messages provided do not inadvertently reveal sensitive information that could compromise the system's security.
Functional Requirements
- Standardized Error Format: Develop a consistent format for error messages that includes an error code, a user-friendly description, and actionable advice or a link to further information.
- Error Categorization: Implement a mechanism to classify errors (e.g., Validation Errors, Execution Errors, System Errors) and manage them based on their category.
- Localization Support: Design error messages in a manner that facilitates future efforts to localize them into different languages.
- Documentation Update: Enhance the user documentation to include a new section dedicated to understanding common errors and their troubleshooting steps.
- Developer Logging: Ensure that detailed error information is logged for developers' use while preventing sensitive information from being exposed to the end-user.
Non-Functional Requirements
- Performance: Introduce minimal performance overhead through the new error handling processes.
- Security: Design error messages to avoid disclosing sensitive data or insights into the system's internal workings.
- Reliability: Develop a robust error handling system capable of gracefully managing and recovering from unexpected system states.
- Maintainability: Ensure that the new error handling mechanism is easy to extend and maintain.
Technical Specifications
Architecture Context
MeshHook leverages SvelteKit for its frontend, Supabase for backend services, and Postgres for data management. Its architecture is centered around webhook triggers, a visual DAG builder, and durable, replayable runs.
Implementation Approach
- Analysis & Audit: Conduct a comprehensive review of the existing error messages for consistency and clarity, identifying common error-generating scenarios.
- Standardization Framework: Develop a standardized error message framework including error codes, user-friendly descriptions, and actionable advice.
- Error Handling Logic:
- Revise existing error messages to align with the new standard.
- Implement logic for error categorization.
- Ensure secure logging of detailed error information for developer insight.
- Testing: Integrate unit and integration testing to validate the display of error messages and safeguard against the exposure of sensitive information.
- Documentation Enhancement: Revamp user and developer documentation to reflect the updated error handling methodology and provide insights into common errors.
Data Model Adjustments
- Adjustments to logging structures might be required to incorporate enhanced error context capture, although no direct changes to existing data models are anticipated.
API Endpoints Adjustments
- Ensure that existing API endpoints adhere to the standardized error information format without introducing new endpoints.
Acceptance Criteria
- All system error messages comply with the standardized format.
- Error messages are accurately categorized with corresponding user guidance provided.
- User-facing error messages do not disclose sensitive information.
- Updated documentation offers comprehensive guidance on common errors and their resolutions.
- Testing confirms the error handling mechanism operates as intended with negligible impact on performance.
Dependencies
- Access to the MeshHook codebase for necessary modifications.
- Collaboration with the UI/UX team to ensure error messages are clear and user-friendly.
- Interaction with the documentation team for the user and developer documentation updates.
Implementation Notes
Development Guidelines
- Follow MeshHook's established coding and documentation standards.
- Write new code that is well-documented, adhering to secure coding practices.
- Employ existing logging frameworks for capturing developer-centric error information.
Testing Strategy
- Develop unit tests for the new error handling logic to confirm conformity to the standard format.
- Execute integration tests to check the correct categorization and handling of errors across different components.
- Manual testing in various scenarios to ensure error messages are informative, clear, and secure.
Security Considerations
- Thoroughly review all user-facing error messages to confirm they do not reveal sensitive information or system details.
- Restrict access to detailed error logs to authorized personnel only.
Monitoring & Observability
- Enhance the system's monitoring capabilities to observe the frequency and types of errors over time.
- Implement alerts for unusual increases in error rates or the appearance of new types of errors.
Related Documentation
- Main PRD, Architecture, Security Guidelines, and Operations Guide documents should be referenced for additional context and standards.
This PRD was AI-generated using gpt-4-turbo-preview from GitHub issue #214
Generated: 2025-10-10
📎 Generated Documentation
- 📄 PRD Document: 214-error-messages.md
- 🎨 PlantUML Diagram: 214-error-messages.puml
- 🖼️ Diagram Image: 214-error-messages.png
This issue body was auto-generated from the PRD. Original issue content is preserved in the PRD document.
Last updated: 2025-10-10