Wishlist: Error Reporting to the end user

[Tim Spindler]

I would personally like to see the error messaging revamped in some way. I have no idea how feasible or complicated this would be but so many errors that are generated are meaningless to the end user and some are meaningless to the developers.

eg. Fix Me: then a bit of code and sometimes not code.

IMHO, no error message should include code but should give messages like "There was a problem updating your the copy record. (and if there is a specific reason like barcode is in use this should be specified instead of of an sql message or some json code message or other code) "

I would have to go through every function but there are instances where something doesn't happen because of a database constraint and no error is generated to the end user and sometime an error is generated with code.

[Holly Brennan (hollyfromhomer)]

I have a specific instance of an error occurring, yet I had no idea because there was no notification.

I was trying to edit lines in the MARC Coded Value Map. To be specific, I was undoing a change I had made months before. I was removing Blu-ray from the simple selector list, so it wouldn't show at the top of that field in the OPAC Advanced Search.

I made the simple change (unchecking the "Is Simple Selector" check box) and clicked 'Save'... and then I clicked 'Save' again, because nothing happened. The 'Save' button didn't gray out or do anything to indicate that my change did or did not get saved. Of course, as the sane person I am, I clicked 'Save' many, many more times before giving up. I had others try. I tried the next day. Nothing. I even looked at the JavaScript console and our server log, but the messages there didn't point at anything specific.

Finally I opened a support case with Equinox, and it was quickly found that it was a permissions problem. But unlike most cases of insufficient permissions, this error didn't supply the nice, helpful pop-up stating the problem.

This is just one example of places where visible pop-up errors would be useful. I definitely appreciate not only getting an error message, but in this case, also stating the specific permission name needed. Sometimes the permission name needed isn't obvious. In this case it was ADMIN_CODED_VALUE, easy enough to find.

Hope this helps a little in the case for getting user friendly error messages.