Errors thrown by express middleware on JSONController routes are not caught properly

Hi there

I noticed that if I throw an error inside of a route, it is caught and the client receives a JSON body response. But if I throw an error inside of some middleware, UseBefore the route, then the error is returned as the body of the response.

For example, this is the body of the response from a custom middleware (AuthrizePlayer) that throws an error:

Error
at AuthorizePlayer.use (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\dist\Middleware\AuthorizePlayer.js:6:15)
at C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\routing-controllers\driver\express\ExpressDriver.js:381:86
at Layer.handle [as handle_request]
(C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\layer.js:95:5)
at next (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\route.js:137:13)
at Route.dispatch (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\route.js:112:3)
at Layer.handle [as handle_request]
(C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\layer.js:95:5)
at C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\index.js:281:22
at Function.process_params (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\index.js:335:12)
at next (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\index.js:275:10)
at expressInit (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\middleware\init.js:40:5)
at Layer.handle [as handle_request]
(C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\layer.js:95:5)
at trim_prefix (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\index.js:317:13)
at C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\index.js:284:7
at Function.process_params (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\index.js:335:12)
at next (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\router\index.js:275:10)
at query (C:\Users\Tim\Desktop\Heroku\cargame2020\node_modules\express\lib\middleware\query.js:45:5)

Compared to the same error (new Error()) being throw inside of the route itself:

{
    "name": "Error",
    "stack": "Error\n    at PlayerController.GetMyName (C:\\Users\\Tim\\Desktop\\Heroku\\cargame2020\\dist\\Controllers\\PlayerController.js:40:19)\n    at ActionMetadata.callMethod (C:\\Users\\Tim\\Desktop\\Heroku\\cargame2020\\node_modules\\routing-controllers\\metadata\\ActionMetadata.js:108:48)\n    at C:\\Users\\Tim\\Desktop\\Heroku\\cargame2020\\node_modules\\routing-controllers\\RoutingControllers.js:99:140"
}

[Kalhama]

I’m also finding this troublesome. I think middlewares and controllers should work in a similar manner.

I also noticed that returning routing-controllers custom errors (ie. throw UnauthorizedError()) yields HTTP 500 when it should return HTTP 401.

I modiefied some code that already exists in the project repo in order to have a workaround until valid stable fix is provided. Example of this workaround attached below.

import { Response } from 'express'
import { HttpError } from 'routing-controllers'

const processJsonError = (error: any): any => {
    if (typeof error.toJSON === 'function') return error.toJSON()

    let processedError: any = {}
    if (error instanceof Error) {
        const name = error?.name !== 'Error' ? error.name : error.constructor.name
        processedError.name = name

        if (error.message) processedError.message = error.message
        if (error.stack && process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'production') processedError.stack = error.stack

        Object.keys(error)
            .filter(
                (key) =>
                    key !== 'stack' &&
                    key !== 'name' &&
                    key !== 'message' &&
                    (!(error instanceof HttpError) || key !== 'httpCode')
            )
            .forEach((key) => (processedError[key] = (error as any)[key]))

        if (this.errorOverridingMap)
            Object.keys(this.errorOverridingMap)
                .filter((key) => name === key)
                .forEach((key) => (processedError = this.merge(processedError, this.errorOverridingMap[key])))

        return Object.keys(processedError).length > 0 ? processedError : undefined
    }

    return error
}

export const middlewareErrorHandler = (error, response: Response): void => {
    response.status(error.httpCode || 500)
    response.json(processJsonError(error))
}

USAGE EXAMPLE

import { ExpressMiddlewareInterface } from 'routing-controllers'
import { Request, Response } from 'express'
import { auth} from '../auth'
import { middlewareErrorHandler } from './common/middlewareErrorHandler'

export class UserMiddleware implements ExpressMiddlewareInterface {
    async use(request: Request, response: Response, next: (err?) => void): Promise<void> {
        auth()
            .then(() => next())
            .catch((err) => middlewareErrorHandler(err, response))
    }
}

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