/handling-errors

name: handling-errors
description: Prevents silent failures and context loss in error handling. Use when writing try-catch blocks, designing error propagation, reviewing catch blocks, or implementing Result patterns.

If the current repo has its own rules/skills covering this topic (check .claude/rules/ and repo CLAUDE.md), those take precedence — apply this skill only where they're silent.

Handling Errors

Error Categories

| Type | Examples | Handling | | ------------ | ---------------------------------- | --------------------------- | | **Expected** | Validation, Not found, Unauthorized| Return Result type, log info| | **Transient**| Network timeout, Rate limit | Retry with backoff, log warn| | **Unexpected**| Null reference, DB crash | Log error, show support ID | | **Critical** | Auth down, Payment gateway offline | Circuit breaker, alert |

Fail Fast vs Degrade Gracefully

**Fail fast** for critical dependencies:

await connectToDatabase(); // Throws on failure - app can't run without it

**Degrade gracefully** for optional features:

const prefs = await loadPreferences(userId).catch(() => DEFAULT_PREFS);

Log at the Right Layer

// ❌ Logging at every layer = same error 3x
async function fetchData() {
  try { return await fetch(url); }
  catch (e) { console.error("Fetch failed:", e); throw e; }
}

// ✅ Log once where handled
async function fetchData() {
  const response = await fetch(url);
  if (!response.ok) throw new Error(`HTTP ${response.status}`);
  return response;
}
// Top level logs the error once

Language-Specific Patterns

• **TypeScript/React**: See [references/typescript-react.md](references/typescript-react.md) for Error Boundaries, typed errors, Result pattern, UI display
• **Python**: See [references/python.md](references/python.md) for EAFP, exception chaining, context managers
• **Go**: See [references/go.md](references/go.md) for explicit error returns, wrapping with %w, sentinel errors

Anti-Patterns

| Pattern | Problem | Fix | |---------|---------|-----| | Empty catch blocks | Hides errors | Log or re-throw | | `return false` on error | Loses context | Return Result type | | Generic "Error" messages | Undebuggable | Include what/why/context | | Logging same error at each layer | Log pollution | Log once at boundary | | Bare `except:` / `catch (e)` all | Catches system signals | Catch specific types |