How to handle errors

[pkrukp]

Hi,

I can't find any information about error handling.

For example I'm using octokit.actions.downloadArtifact - what happens when I can't download artifact, for example

• there's some network problem
• there's some authentication problem
• can't find artifact
• rate limit issue

Will it always throw HttpError or are there some cases when this (or any other) API returns some non-standard object?

Thanks

[gr2m]

You should always get an instance of RequestError in these cases. We are passing through whatever error we are getting from GitHub, which are documented at https://docs.github.com/en/rest/reference

authentication problems can be tricky. You might get a 404, not because the repository does not exist, but because the repository is private, and you don't have access with the current authentication. In same cases you get an explanatory explanation message, but not always. Sometimes the response headers include the required OAuth scopes for the endpoint along with the one the current token has (if it is an OAuth token), and sometimes it doesn't. GitHub's REST API is not as consistent as it could be

To avoid rate limits, I recommend using https://github.com/octokit/plugin-throttling.js/

[till]

Would anyone mind adding an example anyway? I don't want to ask for anything unreasonable, but am not writing JavaScript full-time and just wanted to try to build an action and this seems very complicated. E.g. I expected it to throw, but it doesn't seem to. Or I am using it wrong. Maybe others would find it useful as well?

The docs for Octokit seem really barebones still.

[gr2m]

The README of the @octokit/request-error module shows how the error object looks like:
https://github.com/octokit/request-error.js

An example of handling it would be

try {
  // your code here that sends at least one Octokit request
  await octokit.request("GET /")
} catch (error) {
  // Octokit errors always have a `error.status` property which is the http response code
  if (error.status) {
    // handle Octokit error
    // see https://github.com/octokit/request-error.js
  } else {
    // handle all other errors
    throw error
  }
}

Does that make sense?

I expected it to throw, but it doesn't seem to

Did you maybe forgot to use the await key word in your try block?

[till]

Maybe, I'll check tomorrow.

That example could go there, I can PR it later too.

[till]

I think I got confused as to when to await and when to .then().catch() etc.. But that seems to be working now.

[till]

I made a PR for the change: octokit/request-error.js#334