Better error feedback when using incorrect file

[SpencerLommel]

Overview

When you try to open a file like gateway-info.json with the Thread Dump tool you are just shown the Java stack trace. For some people they may think that this is an error with the software and not because they selected the wrong file.

Potential fix suggestion

We could just display a generic error screen telling users to ensure they are opening the correct thread-dump.json file and we could still have a view more info button similar to the one in the Ignition Designer that displays the Java stack trace if needed.

[paul-griffith]

Yeah, I think this kind of broadly fits into "have a good error feedback mechanism" - Kindling should lean on idioms from Ignition and have a standardized error popup and a user accessible log somewhere.

[SpencerLommel]

@paul-griffith

Kindling should lean on idioms from Ignition and have a standardized error popup and a user accessible log somewhere.

With this, I don't really know how Ignition structures it's code to handle errors. Do you have any insight on how this would be implemented so it more closely resembles how Ignition does things?

I was thinking it would be another core module similar to the recent timezone PR we worked on. Then when parsing a file fails, it calls this generic (something like Error.kt) unless a more specific Error handler is specified

[paul-griffith]

That's basically it. In the Designer and Vision there's a singleton ErrorUtil that you can pass strings and/or throwables in to, and they'll automatically be grouped together into the single pop-up no matter how many errors have happened. At the same time it'll also log them usefully into the common log.

With Kotlin there's some fun opportunities to enhance that basic pattern as well.