Enable JSON errors for better debugging

mix.exs

@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@ defmodule CodeStats.Mixfile do
 
   def project do
     [app: :code_stats,
-     version: "1.3.1",
+     version: "1.3.2",
      elixir: "~> 1.2",
      elixirc_paths: elixirc_paths(Mix.env),
      compilers: [:phoenix, :gettext] ++ Mix.compilers,

web/controllers/pulse_controller.ex

@@ -17,7 +17,7 @@ defmodule CodeStats.PulseController do
 
   def add(conn, %{"coded_at" => timestamp, "xps" => xps}) do
     if not is_list(xps) do
-      resp(conn, 400, "Invalid xps format.")
+      resp(conn, 400, %{error: "Invalid xps format."})
     end
 
     case do_add(conn, timestamp, xps) do
@@ -27,13 +27,13 @@ defmodule CodeStats.PulseController do
         |> json(%{"ok" => "Great success!"})
 
       {:error, :not_found, reason} ->
-        resp(conn, 404, reason)
+        resp(conn, 404, %{error: reason})
 
       {:error, :generic, reason} ->
-        resp(conn, 400, reason)
+        resp(conn, 400, %{error: reason})
 
       {:error, :internal, reason} ->
-        resp(conn, 500, reason)
+        resp(conn, 500, %{error: reason})
     end
   end
 

web/templates/page/api_docs.html.eex

@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@
 <h4>Protocol</h4>
 
 <p>
-  All requests are made using the HTTP protocol and use JSON to serialize the data. Requests with payloads should send the payload as JSON in the request body. Error responses from the server will only return the error string, so if the response code is not in the 2xx series, don't attempt to parse the content as JSON.
+  All requests are made using the HTTP protocol and use JSON to serialize the data. Requests with payloads should send the payload as JSON in the request body. The responses are JSON, error responses will contain the key <code>error</code> which has the error message as value.
 </p>
 
 <h4>Path</h4>

web/templates/page/changes.html.eex

@@ -24,6 +24,14 @@
 
 <h2>Changelog</h2>
 
+<h3>1.3.2 – 2016-06-06 – JSON errors</h3>
+
+<p>
+  <ul>
+    <li>Enabled JSON errors for easier debugging of 500 Internal server errors.</li>
+  </ul>
+</p>
+
 <h3>1.3.1 – 2016-06-05 – Language name fix</h3>
 
 <p>

web/views/error_view.ex

@@ -12,6 +12,10 @@ defmodule CodeStats.ErrorView do
     """
   end
 
+  def render("404.json", _assigns) do
+    %{error: "Route not found."}
+  end
+
   def render("500.html", _assigns) do
     raw """
     <div class="jumbotron">
@@ -23,6 +27,10 @@ defmodule CodeStats.ErrorView do
     """
   end
 
+  def render("500.json", _assigns) do
+    %{error: "The server some kind of exploded."}
+  end
+
   def render("403.html", _assigns) do
     raw """
     <div class="jumbotron">
@@ -34,6 +42,10 @@ defmodule CodeStats.ErrorView do
     """
   end
 
+  def render("403.json", _assigns) do
+    %{error: "You are not allowed to do that."}
+  end
+
   # In case no render clause matches or no
   # template is found, let's render it as 500
   def template_not_found(_template, assigns) do