Web application developers are notoriously bad about building resilient applications. All too often, we implement the “happy path” and then forget (or simply ignore) the many things that can go wrong for any number of reasons. However, even if we do account for the “sad path”, and we do catch and handle errors, it’s not always clear how those errors should be presented to the user. Luckily, Tim has some very practical guidance on the matter that he shares with us:
Error messages sent to the end user need to have an appropriate tone, be free of tech jargon, and shouldn’t pass the blame. They should say what happened and why, provide reassurance, be empathetic, tell them how to fix it (if possible), and give them a course for remediation (customer service, support ticket).
All that and more on this week’s show:
… featuring these beautiful, beautiful people:
With audio editing and engineering by ZCross Media.
For the full show notes and links, visit the episode page. And, be sure to follow the show and come chat with us on Discord! Our website is workingcode.dev and we’re @WorkingCodePod on Twitter and Instagram. New episodes drop weekly on Wednesday.
